Doctor Who: The Faceless Ones

Still feeling the euphoria of having discovered a 'new' reconned Patrick Troughton scene the other night, (and despite it having originally only been a voice-over) I spliced it onto the start of episode one of The Faceless Ones to create my own deranged pseudo-continuity. In the new scene he is, after all, telling Zoe how an old adventure began with the TARDIS getting stolen, which is also how this one starts. And I know that the ongoing narrative will continue until the Dalek ultimately shows up anyway. I just like to think that he began his account at the beginning, that's all.


That said, The Faceless Ones is a dreadful story, with an awesome start, mainly due to being set on location-saturated present-day Earth.


Yep, you read that right. Setting the story on present-day Earth was a good thing, because in those days it was unusual.

(Granted, it does also feature zombies though…)


The mystery unravels with great spookiness and wonder, and there’s a certain amount of sinister paranoia as the Doctor tries to convince ignorant bureaucrats (like the excellent Colin Gordon as the airport Commandant) that aeroplanes are taking-off from Gatwick Airport and disappearing into space.


But the aliens’ plan – making copies of people’s bodies and then leaving the originals on Earth (in a car park!) where anyone can find them – really lets the whole thing down. So much for being such a super-intelligent race. It’s a real shame that all the great promise of the earlier episodes is not satisfied by the end.

Still, what a tremendous relief that Ben and Polly got an exit scene though.