The Monster of Montmartre

Doctor Who writers do love a juxtaposition.  Taking two very different ideas and ramming them together can make for many an interesting story.

In The Monster of Montmartre, Matt Fitton has taken that Doctor Who staple – the Daleks and shoved them into the Moulin Rouge.  Two concepts that really shouldn’t work together but, because its Doctor Who, it does and its huge fun.

Daleks in a historical setting is always fun – The Evil of the Daleks Victoriana; The Dalek’s Masterplan/The Chase’s timehopping exploits; Victory of the Daleks Ironsides.  On audio, the Daleks appearances in history have been few and far between which, considering how often Big Finish seem to use them, is a bit strange.

But Daleks in Paris, 1921 is great fodder for a story.  Fitton has gone with big ideas here.  It’s always more interesting to have the Daleks on the back foot.  Here, the Time Controller Dalek has fallen through time to 1921.  He is desperately trying to create Daleks to reassert his dominance and save himself and as such has ‘married’ the owner of the Red Pagoda (a nightclub which has replaced the Moulin Rouge) – Madame du Temps.  She is, in reality, a Dalek duplicate, but the whole concept of this marriage of convenience is darkly hilarious.

Alongside this, Madame du Temps is providing the Time Controller with people to turn into Daleks by enticing penniless artists with her womanly wiles.  One such artist, Christian, befriends the Doctor before being taken and partly mutated into a Dalek before being rescued.

The most striking idea is that of the Red Pagoda itself.  Where the famous red windmill of the Moulin Rouge once stood is the Red Pagoda – something which resembles a silhouette familiar to the Doctor and Liv – a giant Dalek.  Inside the pagoda’s structure hides the Time Controller and his machinery.  He ascends the levels on a platform, whilst his human agents take the stairs.  It’s bizarre and satisfying at the same time.

The ‘monster of Montmartre’ aspect of the story is actually quite inconsequential.  Strange noises are heard at night on the streets of Paris, but it simply turns out to be the failed experiments of the Time Controller being disposed of.  Quite why it feels the need to do this out in the open rather than just destroy them in the privacy of the pagoda doesn’t really make sense to me but it allows the story to hark back to Spring-heeled Jack’ and similar legends so common the previous century (and indeed, our tour of Victorian times in this marathon).  That said, it’s a story element that’s abandoned fairly early on and doesn’t play a huge part in proceedings when it is there.  The focus is much more on the Doctor and Liv’s search for the missing TARDIS.

I like Liv immensely, but occasionally her dourness can grate.  There’s a few scenes in this story where she is getting information from a local gentlemanly crook.  There is far too much of Liv’s quiet sarcasm and it’s a relief when, later, Liv gets to be far more energetic and active when facing the Daleks.

I’m also not sure I’m a huge fan of the Time Controller.  The Daleks, in general, bore me a little and I do appreciate it when scripts try to do something a little different with them.  There are a couple of ‘prototype’ Daleks the Time Controller has managed to cobble together here which brought to mind the Heath Robinson Dalek from Resolution – although the TV one was far more deadly than these two who can hardly shoot in a straight line.  But the Time Controller doesn’t, for me, quite work.  He is too villainous, too eccentric to be a Dalek.  In a way he’s like a more Dalekified Davros.  He’s all manic glee and crazed insanity.  He comes across a little too like a poor man’s Davros.

The ‘Moulin Rouge’ part of this combination well-realised and definitely brought to mind the Baz Lurhman film.  The sound design in the scenes inside the club is excellent and evokes the hustle and hubbub of the filmic version.  Most striking to me was the use of music.  In the Lurhman film, modern music is juxtaposed with the period setting (songs such as Diamonds are a Girls Best Friend; Your Song; and Like a Virgin all feature) and it was that contrast that made the film so memorable (I’m a huge Lurhman fan, ever since Strictly Ballroom and Moulin Rouge is one of my favourite films).  In The Monster of Montmartre, the music in the nightclub scenes definitely had a more modern feel and I’m sure I heard echoes of some of the film’s chosen songs.

The atmosphere of these scenes was spot on and the 8th Doctor, all Byronesque artistic style, fits in immediately and his very sudden friendship with penniless artist Christian (portrayed not dissimilarly to Ewan McGregor’s character from the film – also named Christian) is quite believable.  After the most ‘tiggery’ of Doctors had become strained by the events of previous Dark Eyes box sets, this story certainly sees his enthusiasm and energy return.  I think it’s also a mark of his developing friendship with Liv.

Whereas A Life in the Day - the previous story in this box set - was, aside from the stolen TARDIS, a self-contained adventure which could be enjoyed beyond the Dark Eyes saga, The Monster of Montmartre sets up the rest of the box set with the return of the Doctor’s oldest frenemy at the close of the adventure.  However, for a Dalek story, this for me still had a lot to enjoy and the Moulin Rouge setting is evocative and lifts the story beyond what could have been a fairly perfunctory story of stranded Daleks.