Old Skool Who Tour: The Romans
Jul. 21st, 2008 08:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rangersylThe Romans
aka Musings of a John Lucarotti Fangirl
"What's the matter? Is my slip showing?"
I wanted to love The Romans, I really did. I almost succeeded -- the first half of part one was promising. It's impossible to argue with scintillating repartee between the Doctor and his companions. But as the story unfolds it careens haphazardly between inappropriate slapstick humor, glaring historical errors, death and destruction, and an unhealthy dose of eyeroll inducing sexism. The result is considerably less than the sum of its parts.
It's official -- I have a problem with Dennis Spooner. The Reign of Terror was clearly superior to The Romans, but even that story sewed the seeds of my discontent. Looking at the old historical genre, John Lucarotti's scripts are head and shoulders above anything from Spooner. Lucarotti brought us the atmospheric Marco Polo and the masterpiece that is The Aztecs. His historicals challenge the audience, ask difficult questions of the time travelers, while at the same time move the characters forward and teach them in meaningful ways. There is an emotional honesty in Lucarotti's scripts that is wholly lacking in anything I've seen from Spooner thusfar.
Lucarotti was ahead of his time. Spooner just tossed a bunch of disparate elements in a cocktail shaker and hoped something tasty would emerge when decanted.
There are parts of The Romans that worked, and worked well. Most notably:
- Yes, it's shallow, but bone-idle Toga!Ian is pretty sexy. Nice calves. Bummer that he was the only shipboard slave that wasn't shirtless. Warned you that was shallow.
- For those who sail the good ship Ian/Barbara, this was a great episode. The lounging, the teasing, the frisky horseplay. The Discontinuity Guide characterizes it as "post-coital" and I'd have to agree. OTP, ahoy!
- William Hartnell was clearing having fun. Spooner writes a great Doctor, he really does. He captures that manic delight that has served the Doctor so well in his later incarnations. I just wish he'd put that much effort into writing everyone else.
- Once again, the chemistry between the Doctor and Vicki is charming. In The Rescue, the Doctor is clearly manipulating Vicki. Here, it's Vicki being the more mature of the two (mind-boggling but true) and is manipulating the Doctor.
- The Doctor's fight scene was great fun, and full of one-liners. "The Mountain Mauler of Montana" in particular seems like a great fic prompt. Then there's the famous, "Gentle art of fisticuffs". The visual humor worked very well here. His playing 'air lyre' was fun, too. Perhaps the reason Hartnell was so obviously enjoying himself was because this gave him the opportunity to explore his comic roots.
Things that drove me nuts:
- What kind of story is this, anyway? Is it Ben Hur? Spartacus? The Three Stooges? Or maybe it's Scooby Doo. The Doctor and Vicki embark on a carefree romp and Ian and Barbara experience the dark underbelly of ancient Rome. Cutting between these stories left me (and my viewing partner) confused. Am I supposed to be worried for The Doctor? Or can I laugh off Barbara's slave auction? Neither Hartnell's impeccable comic timing nor Jacqueline Hill's dignity in the face of degradation make the appropriate impact because there's no internal emotional consistency. Case in point: the murder scene in part one is played out to the accompaniment of cheerful comedic music.
Who has always incorporated humor while telling sometimes gritty, sometimes chilling stories. In The Romans the slapstick and the survival drama clash and cancel one another out. The story is fighting itself all the way through.
- When viewing some forty-odd years later, Classic Who really does require the audience to make some accommodations. It's understood that the production values and the style of storytelling will reflect the era in which it was made. Early Who was not politically correct by any means, and has to be interpreted in context. But in The Romans the audience is bombarded with the objectification of Barbara. Yes, it's the bad guys doing it, but it. just. never. stops. Consider the squick that Terry Nation achieved in just one scene in The Keys of Marinus when the woodsman stroked Barbara's hand. That was it. Pure subtext, but the meaning was clear and sent a shiver up your spine. Here, I can't figure out if I'm supposed to laugh as Nero chases Barbara (and his intent was clear!) as the Doctor is nearby, but comically unaware of her predicament. Or was I supposed to be disturbed? Modern viewing leans towards the latter, and this is something that doesn't hold up well over time.
- The thing about swords is that the bladed, pointy end is sharp, for heaven's sake! I lost track of the number of times someone grabbed a sword by its blade, and then the same instrument was later used as a weapon.
- Plotting to kill the emperor seems a very Christian thing to do, doesn't it?
- As frustration with the story mounted, the glaring historical inaccuracies grated. Nero didn't set fire to Rome, for one, and since the Romans were known for their magnificent aqueducts, can someone please tell the Doctor that means they DID know how to transport water satisfactorily. It's true that by this time Doctor Who was understood to be an adventure program and not the educational one that was originally pitched. Even so -- historical accuracy helps engage the viewer.
The Bottom Line: Individual scenes run the gamut from near-perfect to unintentionally unsettling and frustrating. The Romans is a series of set pieces that may or may not make sense when strung together, with no lasting impressions on the characters and no sense of a coherent narrative. Worth watching at least once for the good bits. Thank heavens for small favors -- they didn't try to stretch this out into six parts.
aka Musings of a John Lucarotti Fangirl
"What's the matter? Is my slip showing?"
I wanted to love The Romans, I really did. I almost succeeded -- the first half of part one was promising. It's impossible to argue with scintillating repartee between the Doctor and his companions. But as the story unfolds it careens haphazardly between inappropriate slapstick humor, glaring historical errors, death and destruction, and an unhealthy dose of eyeroll inducing sexism. The result is considerably less than the sum of its parts.
It's official -- I have a problem with Dennis Spooner. The Reign of Terror was clearly superior to The Romans, but even that story sewed the seeds of my discontent. Looking at the old historical genre, John Lucarotti's scripts are head and shoulders above anything from Spooner. Lucarotti brought us the atmospheric Marco Polo and the masterpiece that is The Aztecs. His historicals challenge the audience, ask difficult questions of the time travelers, while at the same time move the characters forward and teach them in meaningful ways. There is an emotional honesty in Lucarotti's scripts that is wholly lacking in anything I've seen from Spooner thusfar.
Lucarotti was ahead of his time. Spooner just tossed a bunch of disparate elements in a cocktail shaker and hoped something tasty would emerge when decanted.
There are parts of The Romans that worked, and worked well. Most notably:
- Yes, it's shallow, but bone-idle Toga!Ian is pretty sexy. Nice calves. Bummer that he was the only shipboard slave that wasn't shirtless. Warned you that was shallow.
- For those who sail the good ship Ian/Barbara, this was a great episode. The lounging, the teasing, the frisky horseplay. The Discontinuity Guide characterizes it as "post-coital" and I'd have to agree. OTP, ahoy!
- William Hartnell was clearing having fun. Spooner writes a great Doctor, he really does. He captures that manic delight that has served the Doctor so well in his later incarnations. I just wish he'd put that much effort into writing everyone else.
- Once again, the chemistry between the Doctor and Vicki is charming. In The Rescue, the Doctor is clearly manipulating Vicki. Here, it's Vicki being the more mature of the two (mind-boggling but true) and is manipulating the Doctor.
- The Doctor's fight scene was great fun, and full of one-liners. "The Mountain Mauler of Montana" in particular seems like a great fic prompt. Then there's the famous, "Gentle art of fisticuffs". The visual humor worked very well here. His playing 'air lyre' was fun, too. Perhaps the reason Hartnell was so obviously enjoying himself was because this gave him the opportunity to explore his comic roots.
Things that drove me nuts:
- What kind of story is this, anyway? Is it Ben Hur? Spartacus? The Three Stooges? Or maybe it's Scooby Doo. The Doctor and Vicki embark on a carefree romp and Ian and Barbara experience the dark underbelly of ancient Rome. Cutting between these stories left me (and my viewing partner) confused. Am I supposed to be worried for The Doctor? Or can I laugh off Barbara's slave auction? Neither Hartnell's impeccable comic timing nor Jacqueline Hill's dignity in the face of degradation make the appropriate impact because there's no internal emotional consistency. Case in point: the murder scene in part one is played out to the accompaniment of cheerful comedic music.
Who has always incorporated humor while telling sometimes gritty, sometimes chilling stories. In The Romans the slapstick and the survival drama clash and cancel one another out. The story is fighting itself all the way through.
- When viewing some forty-odd years later, Classic Who really does require the audience to make some accommodations. It's understood that the production values and the style of storytelling will reflect the era in which it was made. Early Who was not politically correct by any means, and has to be interpreted in context. But in The Romans the audience is bombarded with the objectification of Barbara. Yes, it's the bad guys doing it, but it. just. never. stops. Consider the squick that Terry Nation achieved in just one scene in The Keys of Marinus when the woodsman stroked Barbara's hand. That was it. Pure subtext, but the meaning was clear and sent a shiver up your spine. Here, I can't figure out if I'm supposed to laugh as Nero chases Barbara (and his intent was clear!) as the Doctor is nearby, but comically unaware of her predicament. Or was I supposed to be disturbed? Modern viewing leans towards the latter, and this is something that doesn't hold up well over time.
- The thing about swords is that the bladed, pointy end is sharp, for heaven's sake! I lost track of the number of times someone grabbed a sword by its blade, and then the same instrument was later used as a weapon.
- Plotting to kill the emperor seems a very Christian thing to do, doesn't it?
- As frustration with the story mounted, the glaring historical inaccuracies grated. Nero didn't set fire to Rome, for one, and since the Romans were known for their magnificent aqueducts, can someone please tell the Doctor that means they DID know how to transport water satisfactorily. It's true that by this time Doctor Who was understood to be an adventure program and not the educational one that was originally pitched. Even so -- historical accuracy helps engage the viewer.
The Bottom Line: Individual scenes run the gamut from near-perfect to unintentionally unsettling and frustrating. The Romans is a series of set pieces that may or may not make sense when strung together, with no lasting impressions on the characters and no sense of a coherent narrative. Worth watching at least once for the good bits. Thank heavens for small favors -- they didn't try to stretch this out into six parts.
