vengeance on varos is a story that aims for a lot of lofty, inherently political messages, which are hard to unpack from each other. it's a story inherently tied to a critical take on the shape of modern liberal democracy by presenting an extreme example of the form in which they take in the modern day. taking swipes at how the media (or, in this case, just any source of information) sways the democratic process, even when the voting populace are convinced that they are making decisions of their own free, anti-establishment will. varos itself is a directly democratic state, in which every decision made by the governor is put to a simple yes-no vote, but the unrelenting stream of information coming solely from the screen everyone has installed in their houses means that they can, quite confidently, present a range of alternatives that is acceptable to them. the inherently non-participatory nature of this voting system, in which the complex nature of voting is stripped down to "we should accede to the demands of galatron" or "we should hold out for better terms", because they are not aware that there is an alternative. at the end of the story, the television is switched off in our perspective characters' house. the people are left to make their own minds up, rather than being told what the options are from their television screen. one could even extend this concept to a future where new sources of information pop up, outside of the control of the economic elites, allowing for a broad range of ideas to make their way to the top.

it's a story that, also, takes aim at punitive justice, looking at it how it is, how it is portrayed in the media. vile torture porn, graphic in nature and not tied to the goal of reducing offending, but rather of fulfilling some twisted, animalistic sense of justice rampant throughout varosian society, eventually cut off when subversion becomes normal and the decision is made to destroy the injustice, torture, and executions of the government. it goes after how poor decisions are made when decision-making is distant, with the death of the chief officer due to his unfamiliarity of the very torture dungeon he himself administers.

perhaps most interesting are the elements of metatext throughout, this deep rumbling as the story cuts to the two people watching the show from their own home, reacting, cheering on the rebels just as the viewers themselves will be. alongside sleep no more, it's one of the only stories whose metatext criticises the viewer, and the very nature of the story itself. the subversion on display in the dome is meant to excite citizens, but not incite them to rebel accordingly. it is subsumed into the capitalist superstructure, just as the story itself would undeniably be.

it's a fabulous episode, and, alongside perhaps a pantheon of snakedance, enlightenment, the face of evil and the ambassadors of death, among my favourite classic stories. well-executed, well-scored, well-dones all around. genuine tension at both the cliffhanger to part 1 and the hanging scene, some great horror with the transmogrification machine. fantastic sets that, even on a bbc budget, makes the story feel expansive.

This is part of a series of reviews of Doctor Who in chronological timeline order.

Previous Story: Attack of the Cybermen

Another really great story, aside from The Twin Dilemma I've been really enjoying Colin Baker's tenure as the Doctor. This is one is steeped in political commentary with interesting implications. Sil represents some interesting ideas and could make for a good villain but I think the design and over-the-top performance puts me off a little. I feel like RTD was heavily inspired by this story for certain elements of the revival, specifically in the commentary on the media landscape and the immobile villain who requires assistants to tend to them (Cassandra).

I really like that the 6th Doctor gets some more traditionally Doctor-y moments while toppling an evil government (a favourite pastime of the Doctor). This is a much more violent story than we've been used to and while I've seen a lot of complaints regarding that I actually think it's quite good here. It's darker but I wouldn't say it's child-unfriendly which is the main thing Doctor Who should strive never to be. Overall, another good story and I hope the rest of the season will follow this level of quality.

Next Story: The Mark of the Rani

It’s a shocking and thoroughly modern concept for an episode. The public voting from their segregated pods on whether people on their screens live or die - all in the name of entertainment, entertainment that gets exported to exploit its full value. This is plugged into a dying “former” prison planet where prospects look bleak for all and even the leadership struggle to avoid a grizzly fate.

Colin Baker performs better in this story, helped by the fact the script is not actively hampering him with a dislikable character. The story also fares better due to featuring remarkably little of the 6th Doctor, meaning we get to focus our attention on the intriguing story around our main character. When he does pop up he has some good one liners and gets to be the hero - it’s a great story for him.

Phillip Martin’s script easily stands out among the output of the new crop of writers on the show. He builds a world that feels real, predicting reality TV, voting in shows and scenes which were later plucked by RTD for his first finale. Sil and his associates who spray him and look after his welfare also remind me of Cassandra from RTD’s time - so it would seem Russell is a fan of this story.

Peri continues to be put through the wringer here. I stand by my belief that she has been given a much harder time than any companion before her (this week almost being turned into a bird) she deals with it marvellously.

Sometimes it can be overly camp, but the darkness works well here. This story proves that Colin Baker’s era is not devoid of any quality and gives me hope for the rest of season 22 and 23. The 45 minute episode format is working for me too.

Yeah, I don't get it.  I went into these episodes knowing they were a bit of a fan-favourite and people really like Sil, but this just didn't click for me.  It's a side of Doctor Who I'm never a fan of and does show up in both New Who and Old, where we get this chaotic, unfocused mess.   I wasn't the biggest fan of Attack of the Cybermen but at least there I could appreciate its relative berevity and at least some neat ideas.  Here though, even two episodes felt too long and dragged out to get through comfortably.  I just couldn't bring myself to care about this alien world.  It all felt too low-budget and artificially put together to get me invested in the setting.  Watching Sil stare at a screen and react to stuff over and over really put me off, reminding me of a bad take on the already questionable character Mojo from X-Men comics.  Sorry, Vengeance on Varos fans, I am not in your camp.

An odd one, for sure. The start is quite fun, because the Doctor doesn't actually show up for ages, and the world created is pretty interesting. Then you start thinking about it a bit more and find yourself thinking "...sometimes this serial veers very close to saying Democracy Bad"