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The Green Death

19TH MAY 1973 - 23RD JUNE 1973

(6 EPISODES)

“The Green Death” is the first six-part Doctor Who serial to be released on DVD as a single disc. Considering the limited disc space available for the bonus material, “The Green Death” contains several short featurettes which somehow manage to do this extraordinarily emotional and memorable story justice.

Above: Mark Gatiss stars as Terry Scanlon in the "Global Conspiracy!" featurette

Much in line with the comic “Oh Mummy!” featurette on the previous DVD release comes “Global Conspiracy?”, which stars the League of Gentlemen’s Mark Gatiss as Terry Scanlon, the BBC’s original Man Alive industrial correspondent in a very amusing little piece also featuring some of the stars of “The Green Death.” Aside from the usual production subtitles and photo gallery, the rest of the special features are divided into three fascinating interviews with Robert Sloman (co-writer with Barry Letts), Stewart Bevan (Professor Clifford Jones), and Colin Mapson (visual effects assistant). The only gripe I

have is that with no all-inclusive “The Green Death” documentary, the absence of a ‘Play All’ feature for these separate interviews is a real pain.

The commentary is very, very good on this DVD. Both Terrance Dicks (script editor) and Barry Letts (producer / co-writer) are on hand to share their vivid experiences of making the show, as is Katy Manning who was playing Jo for the final time in this story. One interesting thing that I learned from the DVD which I had been ignorant of previously is that Katy Manning and Stewart Bevan were together in real life as well as on screen at the time of this story.

The serial has never looked as good as it does on this DVD, and with its specific agenda to address the problems of globalisation and climate change (not to mention being ‘the one with the green maggots’) it really holds up well today. BOSS is a fantastic villain, wonderfully brought to life by John Dearth’s voice talent and the clever use of the oscilloscope when it speaks. Using Stevens (Jerome Willis) as its human agent works very well, giving the actors someone real to play off; so well in fact that the alien intelligence with a human agent concept would recur countless times during the impending Hinchcliffe / Holmes era.

The Welsh setting is also very well done and makes a welcome change from the Home Counties, and although the special effects (dodgy CSO again!) leave a lot to be desired, the story itself is excellent. The creation of the Professor Jones character, with all his similarities to the Doctor, was a ingenious way of bringing the Doctor and Jo’s ‘relationship’ to an emotionally satisfying end. By falling in love and marrying the young Professor, Jo is, in a sense, admitting her own feelings for the (much!) older Doctor. The end of the story is very poignant, the Doctor sneaking out of the celebrations to be alone, and Jo turning around to look for him, before being pulled back into the celebrations by her new fiancé.

On the downside, I do find that the pacing of this story is quite slow - particularly if it is all watched in one sitting - and worse still, I absolutely hate it when Pertwee dresses up as milkmen and cleaning ladies etc… that is the second Doctor’s thing! It just makes me cringe, especially as the third Doctor is so straight-laced otherwise.

And so Jo flies the nest and "The Green Death" ends with one of my favourite ever Doctor Who scenes – the Doctor driving off, alone, in Bessie into the night. It is such a moving sequence that just encapsulates the sadness of Jo leaving so perfectly.

The beginning of the end of an era.

Copyright © E.G. Wolverson 2006

E.G. Wolverson has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.

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