The Caves of Androzani

“I survived. Just.” – Sharez Jek

The Tenth Doctor would seem to be a trend setter when it comes to regeneration, but looking back on this, I can safely tell you the Fifth Doctor got there first.

The episode begins innocently enough, but soon we discover there is a darker side to Androzani Minor. Illegal weapons shipments and mining of a rare life extending drug are the big hitters of this episode making it very unsettling to start with, and this is before we get to one of the most tragic characters of the Fifth Doctor era. 

“DO YOU THINK I’M MAD?! I am mad….”

Sharez Jek is chillingly played by the late Christopher Gable and goes down in history as one of the most memorable performances in Who history. Whilst David Tennant and Karen Gillan have both attracted criticism for their shouty roles, Gable pitches the rage in a believable manner, and complements the character with both rage and tragedy coming through beautifully, and makes for a much more complex character, as he converts to an ally of the Doctor by the end.

 

“The sight of beauty is so important to me, and the stimulus of a mind nearly equal to my own.”

Androzani is consistently voted as the best serial in Doctor who history, and just by looking at the boxes it ticks, it’s easy to see why. Psychologically this episode is very disturbing, partly due to the graphic description of Jek’s burns, his physical depiction doesn’t help to ease our minds either. The mask clearly conceals something awful, the mask itself being quite unnerving, the lapses of anger, the eye that can’t quite see. It’s an extraordinary combination that dares to come close to making you sick. The behaviour of the characters is put up there in the horror category, Jek’s affectionate stroking of a decidedly disturbed Peri comes as close to sexual assault as you’ll get for 80’s pre watershed, but is still concerning. The wanton disregard of life is another, for example in one scene Morgus after killing the President casually orders the lift maintenance man to be shot, Timmin merely taps the order into her pad stoically.

“It feels different this time”

To most audiences the Tenth Doctor was the first to delay his regeneration, however as it turns out in Episode 3 the Doctor begins to regenerate, but he holds it off. This was achieved by superposing the regeneration effect over a shot of the ships view screen from the Doctor’s POV. Unfortunately it wasn’t really picked up on at the time due to the habit of 20th Century Who changing the regeneration effect for each changeover. Davidson did indeed complain that Bryant stole his last scene somewhat due to her large cleavage taking up most of the shot. When the Doctor does at last regenerate a summary of his incarnation is given with the hallucinations of his previous companions willing him to live, it’s a touching scene as a somewhat ambivalent regeneration completes; from the character’s point of view it was a success, from the BBC’s point of view, it was an unknowing disaster.