Dragonfire

Take away that silly cliffhanger in part 1 and I actually enjoy this. Classic type of Who story that manages to do a decent bit of world building and has some good character moments. Even in her first episode Ace is a good addition to the story when she's not saying her name. No buildup to Mel leaving at all though.

Watched the episode and then watched the ‘Behind the Sofa’ commentary. The funniest tidbit is that Sylvester says he prefers Delta and the Bannermen out of his first season because it was “much closer to his later stuff.” I find that so interesting because from a performance perspective, I would very much agree, though I will stress in overall tone of the episode I would definitely not. 7’s persona is a lot quieter and more sinister in that one, as opposed to the three other stories where he, ESPECIALLY in Dragonfire, adopt a much more naive persona? Part of what works brilliantly about 7 is that the fool is a facade for the chess master. In Dragonfire he gives a great performance in slapstick, but there is nothing behind those eyes. Delta and the Bannermen, and especially Remembrance of the Daleks were when they really settled on where to take this character. In spite of that, I cannot stress how great he is in Dragonfire. Edward Peel is also fantastic in this.

And jesus christ this episode looks ugly

Whilst I will admit to being biased - Dragonfire was my first Classic Who story - this is a really good end to the series. The writers have finally figured out the Seventh Doctor's character, we get the introduction of Ace, who I love dearly, and even if Mel's departure comes from out of the blue her + the Doctor's goodbye scene is very well done. (Kane's head melting was also a lot of fun)

The final story of season 24 marks by far the best of the season and the 7th Doctor’s run so far. We get a fantastic and relatable companion introduction that leaves you wanting to know much more about 26 year old newbie Ace who is going to be a wonderful lead opposite McCoy’s Doctor.

This is the best of the Sabalom Glitz trilogy too, with him caught up in debts on this colony spaceship at the beginning of the tale and forming a uneasy but ultimately good natured alliance with The Doctor. You can see that Glitz is a bastard who can’t be trusted, but he has such charisma that you want to route for him anyway. Great character.

Mel looks a little out of place in all this, we never got to understand her character or what really makes her tick. It makes sense then that apropos of nothing she decides she wants to shoot off with Glitz - they make a very odd team.

I didn’t mind though - because the spark between Ace and The Doctor is palpable and delivers a hit the show has been severely lacking since The 5th Doctor said goodbye to Peri - a perfect Doctor/ companion pairing allowing for inspiring, fizzing dialogue.

Other than the oddly set up, literal cliffhanger I enjoyed all of this story. I wasn’t quite sure why The Doctor had put himself in that situation on the cliff until the next episode when Mel and Ace went to traverse the same journey. You can tell RTD took queues from both the light shield and robotic spaceship tannoy voice when putting together The End of the World. The concept of cryogenically freezing anyone who cannot pay off their debts also gets revisited by Moffat in A Christmas Carol. So all in all it’s an influential story which seems to me to mark the start of a classic new era.