Series 1 Episode 25: Sentence of Death

Serial: The Keys of Marinus
Episode: 5 (Sentence of Death)
Doctor: William Hartnell
Companions: Barbara, Ian, and Susan

Writer: Terry Nation
Director: John Gorrie
Producer: Verity Lambert
Original Air Date: 09/05/1964

THE DOCTOR ONE LADIES' DETECTIVE AGENCY (and other stories)

In which William Hartnell comes back from his holidays, Barbara and Susan are Team Watson, the Doctor plays at being a lawyer, and Ian is guilty until proven innocent. Also, domestic violence trigger warning. Because apparently this show is now Eastenders…IN SPAAAAAAAAACE.

We begin with a reshoot of Ian being boshed over the head with a potato gun, this time from an angle that doesn't make it obvious that he’s just having his spine tickled. Again he swoons and falls down next to the unidentified corpse that’s in the room with him, and again a mace is placed in his unconscious hand as his mystery assailant steals the micro-key from its case. Alarms! Drama! Etc.!

Ian comes round to discover he's sustained a painful bump on the bonce and that he is being interrogated by a guard in a vaguely fascist-looking uniform. Ian wants to know what the hell happened here; the guard thinks Ian should be the one answering that question. Apparently he couldn't have got into the room without the duty guard letting him in, and besides nobody gets into the vaults without a probity check. Ian hasn't had one.

Ah, probity probes.

Something else Ian hasn't had since waking up is a single fuck to give about any of this. In fact, he's projecting Barbara levels of Eternally Done right now, and in his furs looks as much like a bear with a sore head as he sounds like one. He's somewhat sobered, however, when he realises he's being accused of murder and their conversation is being recorded. There's also a rather poignant moment when he's asked his name and occupation, and he pauses for a moment before answering that he's ‘a teacher – Science’, as though it’s only just sinking in how ridiculously far he is from that former life. ‘Ian Chesterton, Science Teacher’ seems pretty distant from ‘Ian/Chesterton/Chatterton/Chesserman/Chesterfield/Dear Boy/the Human, Time Traveller’ who’s standing in an alien security vault wearing an outfit from the thirteenth-century Mongolian Empire and a wolfskin shrug. And when Tarron (his interrogator) asks him if he knows the purpose of the micro-key, he just rubs the bump on his head without answering, looking tired – no, not tired, weary.

I know he does have an actual head injury, but I think there’s an argument to be made for this scene being key to Ian’s character development. Increasingly we’re getting these quieter moments from him where he’s not dashing about à la Susan’s goldfish analogy or channelling his energies into being overprotective of Barbara and the gang; and we begin to get the sense that Ian’s the kind of person who has to keep active, not just because his inner pessimist tends to take hold at such times but also because as long as he’s fulfilling this weirdly chivalric ideal of masculinity he can subordinate his identity crises to the immediate need to be the Man of Action. And we can see this here: the minute he stops rushing around, he has trouble remembering who he is and what he’s for. Hashtag He For She; Hashtag Ian Needs Feminism Too.

Anyway, Tarron asks what Ian’s done with the key; Ian, frustrated, tells him he never had the effing thing. Tarron tells Ian he’s being charged with murder – DRAMATIC MUSIC! Ian thinks ‘this business is beginning to run away from me’, and protests that this whole thing is fucking stupid:

IAN: Well there was another man in here, I've got a lump on the back of my head to prove it!
TARRON: The dead man could have hit you before he was killed.
IAN: And I suppose I killed him when I was unconscious?
TARRON: Well it does suggest you had an accomplice, I agree. So you had better produce him, that's my advice to you for what it's worth.
IAN: I don't have to produce him, Tarron, you do! This is circumstantial evidence. You must prove that I did the actual killing!

And now for the real icing on the cake: in Millennius, the legal system dictates that Ian is not in fact innocent until proven guilty but rather guilty until proven innocent. So Ian needs to get a lawyer, sharpish, or he’s going to be executed. GULP. Ian thinks he knows the guy. And is cracking up a bit, because when Tarron asks who he is, this happens:

Keep it together, Ian.

Meanwhile, Barbara is being very polite and charming to the guard on the reception desk and has managed to get Team Tassles permission to see Ian. Susan, Sabetha, and Altos have been making enquiries about the Doctor, who’s been seen around the place but is currently AWOL. I must say I do love Team Tassles as it currently stands, mostly because Babs appears to have become its benevolent matriarch.

Enter Ian, who is pleased to see them but understandably anxious to find the Doctor on account of the fact that ‘the laws in this country are a mockery’. A familiar voice speaks from outside the shot: ‘I quite agree with you, my boy.’

BILLYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY YOU’RE BACK! I didn’t realise how much I missed you.

Everyone except Ian runs to hug him, and it’s beautiful. Team Tardis is back together again, and everything is going to be all right. Apart from the fact that Ian (who sounds a lot more West Midlands when he’s agitated, it must be said) is going to be executed. The Doctor gets his Elle Woods on and tell Ian he’s the legal eagle they need. Bang on.

I just want us all to take a moment to appreciate that the Doctor and Ian are now officially Space Bros. The Doctor actually gives a shit about his humans and is finally stepping up to the plate for a change. Character development for the win.

Later, three beardy men with Interesting Headdresses that look a bit like chefs’ hats crossed with paper lanterns walk into an impressive-looking courtroom. They are the judges. They ask the Real Slim Shady representative for the defence to please stand up, and the Doctor asks for time to gather evidence. The request is granted, but he doesn’t have long, seeing as Ian’s going to be executed in three days unless evidence can be found to prove his innocence. Crikey.

Eyesen, the prosecutor, engages in some low-level smack-talk with the Doctor; the Doctor is sassy and unphased. Team Tassles congratulates the Doctor on his mad legal skills, and the Doctor tells hem he’s been studying the local laws since Eprim – Ian’s supposed victim – was murdered. Altos’s ears prick up at the sound of the name:

ALTOS: (shocked) Eprim?
IAN: He was your friend?
ALTOS: Yes. You found him, Doctor?
DOCTOR: Oh yes, I had met him and arranged to take the micro-key but something must have happened, that's why he tried to take the key earlier than we had arranged.
SABETHA: And he was killed?
DOCTOR: Yes. He must have told his plans to someone else. And that someone else killed him and took the key.
IAN: Then all we have to do is find out who took the key and why!

Rather than take a moment to mourn the loss of his friend, Altos chooses to process his grief through the medium of sass:

The Doctor agrees they all need to get a wriggle on, and sends Altos and Sabetha off to the library to research case histories of Hippogriff murder trials. When Susan asks what she can do, the Doctor says she and Barbara can be his Detectives. Right on. Then Ian asks what he can do. And this happens:

'TRUST ME [I'M THE DOCTOR]' IS BORN.

Sabetha and Altos are pretending to read a blank Space Book. Meanwhile, the Doctor, Barbara, and Susan, are going over events with Tarron, who maintains that the key cannot have left the room because of reasons which I would write down if I could be arsed. Suffice to say, it’s a Jonathan Creek-style locked room mystery, and the Doctor thinks he’s Sherlock Holmes:

BARBARA: Have you any idea how the key got out of here?
DOCTOR: Oh, elementary, elementary.
SUSAN: Grandfather! Do you mean you know? I mean, how? Where?
DOCTOR: All in good time, my child. The important thing is I believe I know who did the killing.

I already knew there was a strong Holmesian thread running through Classic Who, but I didn’t realise it went this far back. More importantly, the Doctor reckons he can figure out what happened by holding an impromptu improv session, which involves Barbara pretending to be Ian, Susan pretending to be the corpse (poor, morbid Susan), and William Hartnell karate-chopping the hapless Jacqueline Hill to the ground. It is a thing of beauty and must be GIF-ed.

Anyway, the upshot is, it’s the so-called relief guard wot dunnit because the easiest way for the murderer to get away without running into security is to pretend to be first on the scene. Babs and Susan are all ready to go charging off to tell Tarron, but the Doctor reckons this will only complete Tarron’s case against Ian, seeing as how he can’t prove it wasn’t Ian wot hid the key in its present location (which the Doctor knows but apparently isn’t telling). He also has a task for Babs and Susan that he thinks they’ll find ‘very interesting’; they look hilariously unconvinced.

It turns out Team Watson’s task is to talk to the relief guard in question. His name is Aydan, and he’s not at home; his wife Kala, however, who would make an excellent Narcissa Malfoy if only because she has the dogshit-under-the-nose facial expression nailed, is smoothly and unflappable hospitable. No sooner has a possible motive for theft been established – to wit, the fact that the key is valuable as hell seeing as there are only five of them in the whole universe – than Aydan himself comes bursting in, freezing in suspicion as he sees our detectives perched on the sofa.

And now it’s Susan’s time to shine, goading Aydan essentially by telling him that her grandfather is going to come down on him like a tonne of bricks in the courtroom, and then eliciting a confession from him using the oldest trick in the book:

SUSAN: I thought you might like to know that we know where the key is hidden!
BARBARA: Susan!
AYDAN: (Alarmed) But you couldn't know where it is! I...

Go Susan. Also, and I don’t say this to detract from Susan’s tactics seeing as how she clearly has the measure of him, how thick is Aydan? Anyway, he resorts to hollow threats, about which Team Watson gives precisely zero fucks.

Aydan, who is clearly a very insecure and violent man, makes as though to strike Susan but is held back by Kala, sparing Babs the necessity of going into kill mode. They leave the premises and immediately start eavesdropping. Aydan is aggressive, Kala placatory, and then something very disturbing happens: there’s a smacking sound as though Aydan has hit Kala very hard indeed, followed by a slamming door. Barbara and Susan look alarmed and immediately bend down to look in at the keyhole, but can only see a hand pressing the buttons of a comms device; footsteps sound in the corridor, and they have to scarper.

Yikes. What a bastard. I’d like to think that, had they not been forced to flee, Barbara and Susan would have stormed the place, or at least waited until Aydan had left before sneaking back in to check if Kala was ok. I’m actually going to save my comments on the domestic violence subplot for the final episode in this serial, because it’s only then that we get the bigger picture on Kala’s relationship with Aydan, and I have Things To Say about the way Terry Nation has used the fact that Aydan clearly knocks his wife about as a red herring. Which is…hmmm. It’s also a surprisingly complex and adult situation for a children’s show, so I want to do it justice by talking about it properly once it’s reached its conclusion. For now I’m just going to do a massive Humanities buzzword copout and say it’s – wait for it – problematic. But this will get the space it deserves.

Back to the plot, it seems someone in the Kala/Aydan household is calling Eyesen the prosecutor. We only get to hear Eyesen’s side of the conversation: an unspecified ‘she’ may know something, an unspecified mutual friend may be unable to go through with an unspecified something, and the person on the other end of the phone may have to do an unspecified something about it. Clear? I thought so.

Back in court, Eyesen is arguing that Ian is, like, totes guilty because the murder weapon has Savage Vibes or something and was found in Ian’s right hand. The Doctor gets his Poirot on, telling the assembled court that the murderer is IN THIS VERY ROOM but it sure as hell isn't his client (or words to that effect).

Such a drama queen. Or whatever the gender-neutral equivalent of a drama queen is. What is that, by the way?

Anyway, the Doctor calls Sabetha to the stand for a flagrant bit of theatre in which he shows her a picture of the micro-key and asks her whether she recognises it. When she answers in the affirmative, he asks her whether she knows where it is, at which point she produces one of her own micro-keys (or perhaps the fake one), to general astonishment. He asks her where she got it; she tells him the man who murdered the guard; he asks her where he is and whether she can point him out, and she singles out Aydan sitting in the front row. Doctor, you devious little blighter.

So Aydan, as well as being a murderer and a wife-beater, is also – as we saw earlier – thick as shit, and blurts out that she can’t have found it. Realising he’s incriminated himself, he makes a dash for it, AND IS GRABBED AND RESTRAINED BY BARBARA AND SUSAN. Seriously, do NOT fuck with Team Watson. Babs in particular looks like she’s ready to wrestle him to the ground, while the morbid ‘gonna walk you into a sword’ gleam is back in Susan’s eye.

Recognising that he is in the grip of unyielding badasses, Aydan promptly decides to spill his guts. He gets as far as ‘they made me do it’ before he’s murdered by lasers (assailant unknown) and falls dead to the floor. There’s a stunned silence before Kala sinks to the ground and starts weeping over the body.

Later, an unrepentant Doctor is explaining his tricksy means to the judges. Meanwhile, Ian and Babs are chatting to Tarron, who’s telling them about psychometric testing, whereby ‘[e]xperts are able to define from an object the characteristics of the person who last had contact with that object’. Which explains all that business with the murder weapon earlier. Babs comments that it’s an improvement on fingerprints; Tarron is nonplussed; Babs says it’s not important. LOL. Though what on Earth are you talking about, Babs? Psychometric testing on inanimate objects sounds fucking mental and seems to involve a great deal of profiling. Then this happens:

I’m glad the episode has this moment, as I was beginning to be concerned about the fact that neither Barbara nor Susan had brought up the fact that Aydan was physically abusive. She doesn’t elaborate, and clearly Ian doesn’t grasp the full significance of her grim aside, but I’m glad she for one won’t be shedding a tear over the loss of a murder with a nasty temper who takes it out on his wife. And speaking of Kala, she’s been sent home with some drugs because she’s ‘hysterical’. Sigh.

As the tribunal resumes, Altos asks Babs where Susan’s got to; apparently she’s gone to get Ian’s statement and has in no way been kidnapped or imperilled or anything like that. But OH NO, it looks like Ian’s still in the doghouse and the Doctor’s little spectacle has backfired: Eyore or Eyesore or whatever the prosecutor’s name is submits that Ian is still guilty as hell, that Aydan was clearly coerced into being his accomplice, and that Team Tassles probably killed him.

At this point, the guard from the security desk comes in, whispers to Babs, and she, Susan, Altos, and Sabetha scarper from the courtroom unnoticed. The head judge, meanwhile, reckons Eyesen is right, and the other two judges do a lot of vigorous nodding. The Doctor asks for time to produce new evidence, and is denied. Which is unsurprising after the stunt he pulled, I suppose. So now Ian’s going to be executed.

Outside, Babs is talking to her mate from the security desk, who’s been given a note to give to her. And OH CRIKEY, this is what it says: ‘There will be another death if you disclose where the key is hidden.’ Altos reckons this is proof that someone else was involved and is keen to get it to Tarron and the Doctor sharpish. Babs wants to know whose death is on the cards, and as if to answer her question, a phone begins to ring.

Babs’s mate from the security desk picks up the phone and hands it to Babs, smiling pleasantly. I know I’m holding up the momentum at a crucial moment, but I like this guy. I want to see more of Barbara and the Security Desk Guy. He could be the new Ganatus. It’s a niche ship, but I think it’s got sails.

Anyway, it’s Susan…and ‘they’ made her call Babs…AND ‘THEY’ ARE GOING TO KILL HER!!

SHIT THE BED WHERE IS SUSAN AND WHO’S GOT HER AND WILL SHE BE OK AND WILL BABS COME STORMING TO THE RESCUE? HOW WILL THE DOCTOR GET IAN OUT OF THIS LEGAL PICKLE? WILL ALTOS AND SABETHA EVER GET NEW CLOTHES? WILL BARBARA GET TO HAVE SOME QUALITY TIME WITH THAT PLEASANT-LOOKING SECURITY GUARD? AND WHERE IS THAT SODDING MICRO-KEY?

Summary (as applicable to this episode)

Does it pass the Bechdel test? Yup.

Is the gaze problematic? Nope.

Is/are the woman companion(s) dressed 'for the Dads'? No. Altos, on the other hand...

Does a woman fall over/twist her ankle (whilst running from peril)? No, though the Doctor does send Babs flying again.

Does a woman wander off alone for the sole dramatic purpose of getting into trouble so she can be rescued later? Yup. Susan goes off to get Ian's Statement and promptly gets kidnapped.

Is/are the woman companion(s) captured? Yup.

Does the Doctor/a man companion/any other man have to rescue the woman companion(s) from peril? Not yet.

Is a woman placed under threat of actual bodily harm? Yes. Susan by her kidnappers, Susan and Barbara by Aydan, and Kala by Aydan.

Is/are the woman companion's/s' first/only reaction(s) to peril gratuitous screaming? No.

Does a woman companion go into hysterics over something reasonably minor? No.

Is a woman 'spared' the ordeal of having to do/witness something unpleasant by a man who makes a decision on her behalf/keeps her deliberately ignorant? No.

Does a man automatically disbelieve or belittle something a woman (companion) says happened to her? No.

Does a man talk over a woman or talk about a woman as though she isn't there? Aydan.

Does the woman companion have to be calmed/comforted by the Doctor/a man companion/a man? Barbara is still on cuddlewatch.

Is a woman the first/only person to be (most gratuitously) menaced by the episode's antagonist(s)? Ian's under threat of death but the women get menaced a fair old bit.

Is a man shamed into doing/not doing something because the alternative is a woman doing/not doing something? No.

Does the woman companion come up with a plan? Nope, it's the Doctor running the show this week. Though I'd say Susan tripping Aydan up in his story is sort of a plan.

Does the woman companion do something stupid/banal/weird which inspires a man to be a Man with a Plan? Nope.

Does a woman come up with a theory and is it ridiculed by the Doctor/a man? The Doctor does pour cold water on Susan and Barbara's plan to tell Tarron about the relief guard being the culprit.

Does a woman call the Doctor out on his bullshit? Nope.

Does a woman get to be a badass? Barbara and Susan are badass detectives and heavyweights.

Is the young, strong, straight, white male lead the person most often in control of the situation? Nope, it's the Doctor in charge this week.

Is there past/future/alien sexism? Yup. Aydan is the worst.

Does a 'present'-day character call anybody out on past/future/alien sexism? Only subtly alluded to by Babs.

Does an past/future/alien person have the hots for a woman companion and is it reciprocated? ONLY IN MY MIND.

Did a woman write/direct/produce this episode? No/No/Yes.

Verdict

Now that's more like it! Billy's back, and I didn't know I'd missed him but please never leave for more than one episode ever again. The Doctor and Ian get some nice character development, Babs and Susan get to be Team Watson but an independent Team Watson that the Doctor!Holmes actually trusts to do the job without secretly following them around and undermining their efforts. It's also nice to see Barbara and Susan have a few lighter scenes with the Doctor where they're all doing improv at the murder scene, the highlights of which include Barbara being very earnest in her game of 'what would Ian do?' and Susan being an Addams Family weirdo who's way too into pretending to be a corpse. A troubling domestic violence subplot which I'll get into next week once it plays out. Overall, however, a much-needed change of pace and genre.