The Keys of Marinus

Serial E, in 6 parts

• The Sea of Death: first broadcast 4-11-64 / 9.9 million viewers
• The Velvet Web: 4-18-64 / 9.4
• The Screaming Jungle: 4-25-64 / 9.9
• The Snows of Terror: 5-2-64 / 10.4
• Sentence of Death: 5-9-64 / 7.9
• The Keys of Marinus: 5-16-64 / 6.9

Written by: Terry Nation
Produced by: Verity Lambert
Directed by: John Gorrie

Mini-Reviews and Quotes:

"The main thing I remember is that the director, John Gorrie, seemed totally disinterested. All the time we were doing this (model) shot, Gorrie was sitting at the other end of the studio reading a newspaper!" - Raymond Cusick, designer, quoted in The Handbook: The First Doctor by Howe, Stammers, and Walker (Virgin: 1994).

The Brian Review:

Now the cheese begins...

The Keys of Marinus has its good points, but it's a sharp decline from the preceding stories. This is the episode that introduces the wobbly sets, silly cliffhangers, and monsters in rubber fetish suits that Doctor Who's critics always complain about.

The episode has a very loose structure. The Doctor and his companions are sent on an epic quest to scour the planet Marinus, searching for hidden circuits. They have a series of mini-adventures, some compelling, some downright silly. The city of Morphoton segment is excellent, as Barbara once again saves everyone by seeing through an illusion cast by evil brain creatures in bell jars. In one particularly side-splitting scene, the hapless Doctor is hypnotized into thinking that a dirty old mug is a gigantic lab full of state-of-the-art equipment!

The jungle segment is decent, but the ice cavern scenes fall flat (those ice knights wouldn't scare an old granny, and Terry Nation sees fit to treat us, once again, to a really boring chasm-crossing sequence!) In the last and perhaps best mini-adventure, Ian is put on trial for murder in the city of Millenius, and defended by his newfound friend, the Doctor (note that this is the first time the Doctor seems really eager to help Ian, rather than kidnap or kill him!) The solution to the murder mystery is pretty simple but interesting nonetheless.

Probably the worst thing about this episode is John Gorrie's ho-hum direction. Under a better director, this story might have had some cohesion. As it is, The Keys of Marinus is disjointed and uneven. Even as its worst, though, this episode is still watchable.

OVERALL RATING: B-