One Corpse Too Many

Starring Derek Jacobi as Cadfael and Sean Pertwee as Hugh Beringar.

When King Stephen defeats the Empress Maud's forces at Shrewsbury and makes an example of them by hanging the entire garrison, the monks of the nearby Benedictine abbey of St. Peter and St. Paul take on the grisly task of preparing the bodies for burial. In the process, Brother Cadfael, the abbey's herbalist, notices that while there were 94 men in the garrison, there are 95 bodies below the gallows, and though the extra man was certainly strangled to death he was evidently not hanged. Granted permission to look into the matter, Cadfael investigates with the help of a new novice going by the name of Godric. Meanwhile, the king assigns a new follower, one Hugh Beringar of Maesbury, to prove his loyalty by locating a missing girl, Godith Adeney--not only was she betrothed to Hugh in childhood, she is also the daughter of one of the few adherents of Maud to escape the siege, which would make her a valuable hostage should the king get his hands on her.

I've read this book (and the whole Cadfael series) several times, and there's a lot going on in this one, as in most; I haven't even mentioned the subplot of the escaping squire and FitzAlan's treasury. You'd think they would barely be able to hit the high points, let alone fit in any of the nuances, in a 75-minute TV movie. But in fact this is a fantastic adaptation, thanks to both the script and the acting. Sean Pertwee stands out, and is appropriately ambiguous as Hugh; Derek Jacobi is stellar as always, and appropriately dogged (and devious) as Cadfael. The girl who plays Godith makes such an unconvincing boy that I hardly feel it counts as a spoiler to mention her disguise, but the fact that the unctuous Brother Jerome, the master of novices, is completely taken in anyway is entirely in character for him, and it's a credit to the actor, Julian Firth, that he really sells Jerome's combination of self-importance and unworldliness.

Some of the later entries in the TV series drifted pretty far from the source material, and I think they suffered for it, but these early ones are great. I picked up the first four on sale at Barnes and Noble last weekend, and I think my husband has already watched them twice.

Doctor Who: Genesis of the Daleks (Story 78)

starring Tom Baker as the Doctor, Elisabeth Sladen as Sarah Jane Smith, Ian Marter as Harry Sullivan, and Michael Wisher as Davros.

The Doctor (fourth incarnation), traveling by transmat beam with Sarah and Harry in tow, is intercepted and redirected to the distant past of the planet Skaro, where the long war of attrition between the Kaleds and the Thals is just about to lead to the creation of the Daleks by the Kaled chief scientist Davros, who considers them the only hope for the ultimate survival of his race. A mysterious Time Lord instructs the Doctor to prevent the Daleks from ever coming into existence, or failing that, to introduce changes into their programming in order to make them less aggressive creatures.

The Time Lord considers this a service to the future, preventing the carnage and destruction of the many Dalek wars and conquests. The Doctor calls it genocide, and accepts the assignment under duress, having no way to get back to the TARDIS except by the time ring he is offered in exchange for completing the mission.

Of course, the real creator of the Daleks was on hand here as well, since Terry Nation wrote this six-part serial to anchor Tom Baker's first season as the Doctor. It was also the first season with Philip Hinchcliffe as producer and Bob Holmes as script editor, and they wasted no time in trying to take the show in a darker, grittier, more grownup direction; this particular story is unremittingly grim.  It's a thoroughgoing retcon of the Daleks' origin; Davros had never before been alluded to, much less named, and the humanoid race that gave rise to the Daleks had previously been called the Dals, not the Kaleds.

As always with a six-parter, there's a bit of stretching to fill the time, elaborate escape attempts that go absolutely nowhere, and so on.  But Davros is a brilliant creation, and it was inspired casting to have him portrayed by Michael Wisher, who had provided Dalek voices in a couple of previous serials. He's genuinely frightening, and never more so than when he's calmly contemplating the intellectual exercise of whether, having created a virus that would destroy all life, he would then use it. (Spoiler: He would.)

I am pleased that the library where I work has started to get some of these classic Doctor Who serials. Mostly 4th Doctor so far, with a little bit of the 5th Doctor for good measure; I'll have to suggest some good 3rd Doctor stories next.

Doctor Who: The Face of Evil (Story 89)

starring Tom Baker as the Doctor and Louise Jameson as Leela.

Aiming for Hyde Park, the Doctor (4th incarnation) unexpectedly lands in an alien jungle instead; being the Doctor, he decides to have a look round. Much to his astonishment, the local savages recognize him immediately as the Evil One who is holding their god, Xoanon, captive behind an impenetrable wall, and his protests that he doesn't remember imprisoning anybody and they must be mistaken seem pretty thin even to him once he sees his own face carved on a cliffside in the style of Mount Rushmore. With the help of Leela, a young woman who has been cast out of the tribe for speaking out against both her leader and the shaman who speaks for the god, the Doctor sets out to discover exactly who and what Xoanon is, and why he himself made such an impression the last time he visited this planet.

When my boyfriend decided that he'd enjoyed Paul enough to own a copy, he also went through Amazon looking for a Doctor Who story with Tom Baker to give me, partly because he'd enjoyed Shada as well (but chiefly, I think, so that he'd be buying enough to qualify for free shipping; Amazon has a lot of frivolous purchases to answer for with that policy). He'd already ordered this one when he asked me what I thought of it, and was vastly relieved when I told him that as the introduction of Leela it was a fondly remembered favorite.

I was pleased to see that the story held up really well, in spite of the admittedly cheesy no-budget sets and effects. The writing is very sharp; this is the source of one of my favorite lines from the whole series, when the Doctor points out to Leela, "The very powerful and the very stupid have one thing in common: They don't alter their views to fit the facts, they alter the facts to fit their views. Which can be very uncomfortable if you happen to be one of the facts that needs altering."

Tom Baker's Doctor is more imperious than I remembered, but Leela is still five kinds of awesome. What I didn't know when I first saw this story back in the 80s is that it was actually quite rare for the show at that time to present a story about the Doctor having to clean up the consequences of his own previous good intentions. His own assertions to the contrary (and he says it at least twice in episodes of this very serial), the Doctor doesn't always have all the answers.  All in all, a very good story to show my boyfriend why I loved Doctor Who so much in high school!

Clouds of Witness

Lord Peter Wimsey returns from an extended visit to Corsica to find his family's name all over the police reports: his sister Mary's fiance has been found shot dead, and their brother Gerald, the Duke of Denver, has been arrested for the murder. Lord Peter and Inspector Parker attempt to find the real killer, or at least to clear Gerald, but they find the problem with the case is too many clues.

I have read this book as well, but what I really want to talk about is the BBC production with Ian Carmichael as Lord Peter.  Mark Eden played Parker, Rachel Herbert was Mary, and Glyn Houston played Lord Peter's indispensible manservant Bunter with wonderful aplomb.  It has the look of 1970s BBC drama, filmed mostly on unconvincing sets but wonderfully acted, especially by Carmichael and Houston.  One of the extra features on the DVD is an interview with Ian Carmichael, in which he disarmingly admits up front that he was always a good 20 years too old for the role.  Indeed he was, but he certainly had the attitude right!