Doctor Who: Full Circle (1980)

Despite her original reticence about joining the “Doctor” (Tom Baker) on his quest for the key to time, “Romana” (Lalla Ward) is none to pleased at the prospect of heading back to her homeland. Fortunately for her, there’s a bit of an hitch with their return journey and they end up on “Alzarius”. This place is run by folks who live inside a crashed intergalactic liner which is frequently surrounded by a mysterious fog and by some indigenous life forms called the “Marsh Men”. These rather brutish creatures certainly give K9 an headache as the “Doctor” tries to find out just what’s going on and why they have even diverted to this misty and swampy world. All the while, there are the antics of “Adric” (Matthew Waterhouse) to factor in too as he and his group of friend plan to hijack the ship, and even the famous blue police box, from their current ownership even though nobody left on board the cruiser, for generations, has had any idea how to pilot the thing. I couldn’t help thinking that the purpose of this rather disjointed story was to introduce us to new characters and to sign off old ones, and on that score it works ok. The visuals are all a bit basic, though, and the presence of the ever-wooden George Baker doesn’t really do it any favours either as it rather lurches along derivatively for an hour using a few sets and rubber suits that we have seen quite recently before. Tom Baker is beginning to lose the glint in his eye and the series is beginning to look a little tired, now. Worth a watch, but not one of the more memorable stories.