Doctor Who 60th Anniversary: "The Robots of Death" (Tom Baker)

The Doctor (Tom Baker) and his companion, Leela (Louise Jameson) find that the TARDIS has landed inside a vast, tank-like mining vehicle traversing a barren desert world. 

The travelers in time and space also find that they are in terrible danger.  Specifically, crew members aboard the colossal rig are being killed by an unseen assailant who leaves behind “corpse markers” on each victim.  These tags are typically used to signify that a robot has been destroyed.

Doctor and Leela soon learn that the rig’s crew -- and the society from which it hails -- is completely dependent on humanoid robots.  In fact, several “classes” of robots are aboard the rig, including the Dumbs (mutes), the Vox, and the SuperVox.  The Doctor concludes that somehow the robots have overcome their peaceful programming and are committing murder.

The question soon becomes one of human survival.  Are the robots developing awareness of their status as slaves, or is there a dark humanoid force behind the killings?

In my 1999 book, A Critical History of Doctor Who on Television, I tagged “The Robots of Death” as one of the best Doctor Who serials ever produced, and I still feel that my initial assessment is accurate. In particular, I believe that this conclusion regarding quality is merited because of the production design and costuming, which enhance a story that is about nothing less than the horrors of slavery.  In this case, however, the slaves are not human beings, but robots.

First and foremost, the robot costumes in “Robots of Death” underline the theme about slavery.  The machines wear Asian-themed serving clothes which suggest their status as underlings.  Their molded plastic faces, similarly, show only a mask of politeness.  In other words, the robots represent the smiling but subservient face of a peasant or slave class. The Robots don suits of plain green, or black, and this gives the impression that they are not really meant to be noticed.  They are but…background noise in an indulged culture.

By purposeful contrast, the men and women aboard the mining rig wear impractical, ornate, glittering costumes that shine and dazzle.  These costumes are frequently gold or silver, to boot.  Each human character also wears an ostentatious or flowery head-dress to indicate his or her individuality and even, in some sense, “royalty.”  Again, a clever costuming touch creates a contrast with the appearance of the robots, who all look virtually identical.  Individuality then, is for masters, but not slaves.

Similarly, the mining rig “crew” wears elaborate painted eye-make-up, and again, if there is time to apply such intricate designs on the face every day then it is clear that someone else -- namely the slaves -- must be responsible for the day-to-day operation and survival of the Empire.

The costumes and make-up in “The Robots of Death” thus express beautifully the idea of an alien culture both decadent and indulgent in its own luxury.  In regards to the production design, the interior of the mining vessel forwards the very same notion.  It looks more like a comfortable ocean liner than a utilitarian mining craft.  

The crew’s behavior -- indulging in petty competition, gossipy talk, and lavish feasts -- also reinforces the notion of a culture that is so separated from the struggle for life and death that its people no longer even recognize that they are in danger.  The humans here treat the robots only as things, and have grown so lazy and complacent that their race would actually die out without the robots serving and maintaining the basics of civilization.  

Outside of the production design, wardrobe, and make-up choices that adeptly reinforce the notion of a corrupt society and an exploited underclass, “The Robots of Death” plays very much like an Agatha Christie novel.  Each character on the mining vessel boasts a mysterious history, a secret identity and perhaps, even, a motivation for murder.   

The story resolves with the truth about a man named Taryn Kapel who was raised by robots and is sensitive to their exploitation.  The name Taryn Kapel seems very similar to Karel Čapek, the late-nineteenth century author who introduced the world to the term “robot.”  In this way, "Robots of Death" connects right here to our experience and history on Earth, and the development of automation.

“The Robots of Death” is a remarkable serial, and one augmented by brilliant execution, but it succeeds so admirably because it reminds viewers of an unpleasant human quality (and one later seen in regards to the Ood). 

Humans prize comfort, at times, over equality or justice. Only the Doctor -- an outsider -- can point out this foible.

And he does it with a grin.

Doctor Who's 60th Anniversary: "The Claws of Axos" (Pertwee)

An organic spacecraft crashes near the Nuton Power complex, and a national emergency is declared.  

UNIT forces including the Doctor (Jon Pertwee), Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart (Nicholas Courtney) and Jo Grant (Katy Manning) arrive on the scene.  

They soon learn that the alien pilots of the ship -- the Axons -- require aid and assistance.  

The Axons, who possess biological or organic technology, want to remain on Earth until their damaged vessel’s power supply can be replenished.  In exchange, they promise to share Axonite -- a unique power source and “thinking” molecule -- with the human race.

After examining Axonite, the Doctor learns that the Axons and their material are part of a single, living vampiric entity with the capacity to destroy the Earth.  When Jo is held hostage and endangered by the Axons, the Doctor must make some difficult choices.

And complicating matters, the Doctor’s sworn enemy and rival -- The Master (Roger Delgado) -- is working with the Axons.

The era of the Third Doctor -- played by Jon Pertwee -- brought a huge shift in terms of Doctor Who’s already-flexible format.  

No longer would the Doctor regularly travel to other worlds and time periods.  Instead, as UNIT’s “scientific adviser,” he would help to defend the Earth from various alien threats and invasions.  If the William Hartnell and Patrick Troughton eras featured stories based on “The Time Travel Syndrome” I wrote about yesterday, Jon Pertwee era stories were from another science fiction tradition all-together: the Quatermass stories of writer Nigel Kneale.

Quatermass had actually aired on British television a decade before Doctor Who, and the series involved the exploits of Bernard Quatermass, a dedicated man of science.  In one story, Quatermass investigated an alien fungus that an astronaut returned from outer space carrying, in a tale not entirely unlike Who’s “The Ambassadors of Death.”

Another Quatermass series, Quatermass and the Pit showcased the scientist’s excavation of an ancient spaceship in Hobb’s Lane which revealed the truth about the Devil, occult legends, and demonic possession.  This story was also retold, after a fashion, in another Doctor Who serial of Pertwee’s era: “The Daemons.”

The era of the Third Doctor also was the first age lensed in color, and it gave the Doctor a recurring or regular nemesis: the Master (Roger Delgado).  The Master was another renegade Time Lord, and was to the Doctor what Professor Moriarity was to Sherlock Holmes.  

Finally, the Time Lords who had been established in the serial “The War Games” as draconian, unfeeling arbiters of cosmic justice were re-framed in Pertwee’s more swashbuckling era as cosmic bureaucrats and task maskers who would occasionally send the Doctor on a mission or two.  In other words, they became the “M” to his agent 007.

If all this discussion of antecedents makes Doctor Who of this era sound derivative or somehow unworthy, however,, then a disservice has been done.  Pertwee’s Doctor was a colorful man of action, and no doubt, the most stable of the Doctor’s many incarnations (save, perhaps, for Peter Davison’s).  

Also, by stranding the Doctor on Earth in the late 20^th century, the series writers had to meaningfully grapple with the fall-out of his decisions. Suddenly, the Doctor could not just right a wrong as he perceived it nd travel away, forgetting his every action.  Instead, The Doctor had to consider what was best for his new “home” – the Earth -- and audiences saw the Doctor attempt to balance human and “other” interests in serial such as “Doctor Who and the Silurians” and “The Sea Devils.”

The early 1970s was also a time of immense concern about environmental issues.  Genre films such as No Blade of Grass (1970), Doomwatch (1972), Z.P.G. (1972), and Godzilla vs. Hedorah (1972) all concerned the menace created by man’s pollution of the Earth.  Jon Pertwee’s era of Doctor Who  -- which occurred during those same early years of the decade -- likewise obsessed on matters of the environment.  

Serials such as “The Green Death” and “Inferno” gazed at the reckless practices of modern man (and big business, even) vis-à-vis Mother Nature.  Even those stories set on other worlds, such as “Colony in Space” and “the Mutants” concerned  imperialistic “empires” that plundered other worlds for their natural resources.  

Connected with this theme of pollution/environmentalism, Doctor Who of the Pertwee era took dead aim at bureaucrats, and their “country first, planet second” approach to dealing with roiling issues like the Energy Crisis or pollution.

One of the best serials of the period is “The Claws of Axos,” a tale which introduces a unique alien race equipped with organic technology.  This bio-mechanical approach reappeared later in Doctor Who history (in serials such as “Terror of the Zygons” and “The Android Invasion,” in the Tom Baker Era), but it epitomizes the environmental approach to storytelling in the Pertwee epoch.  

The Axons, unlike humans, see themselves as being “a part” of their world/technology/environment, not as beings distinctly separate from it.  This is a crucial distinction in terms of world-view.  Humans are able to look at the Earth and see it as a separate thing, and it is that sense of distance, I presume, which makes abusing Mother Nature all that much easier.  We don't consider it as being part of us.  The Axons and their ship...they're all part of the same thing; the same "hive" mind.

In “The Claws of Axos,” viewers also see the avarice and selfishness of the British government as it seeks to control distribution of the alien Axonite so it can make a profit by selling the substance to other nations.  The point, of course, is that as "separate" nations on Earth, countries consider their best interests, even at the expense of the planet as a whole.  

Minister Chinn, the bureaucrat behind this plot in "The Claws of Axos," exemplifies the worst in the human race in this regard.  The Doctor, in his role as concerned outsider, rails against Chinn and his agenda, and audiences can see how short-sighted Chinn's thinking really is.

As an alien stranded on Earth and therefore forced to suffer the consequences of our bad decisions, the third Doctor is a very vocal crusader and critic of mankind.  I admire this aspect of the character, and the fact that the Third Doctor -- a man of peace trapped on a planet at war with himself -- brings it out so successfully.  

Some of this thematic material also comes forth in the interplay between the Brigadier -- a (perhaps reluctant) man of the establishment -- and the Doctor, a man rather distinctly not of the establishment.  These characters are co-workers (and occasionally friends, of course), but they work together to arrive at the best solution to the crisis.  Still, their relationship often possesses a level of tension, and that's another tangible joy of the Pertwee Era.

Doctor Who 60th Anniversary: "Tomb of the Cybermen" (Troughton)

The TARDIS lands on barren Telos, and the Doctor (Patrick Troughton), Jamie (Frazer Hines) and Victoria (Deborah Watling) encounter an archaeological team led by Professor Parry (Aubrey Richards).  The obsessed scientist is in search of the fabled lost tombs of the deadly Cybermen.

Also on this excursion are its financiers: logician Eric Klieg (George Pastell), Kaftan (Shirley Cooklin), and her bodyguard, the hulking Toberman (Roy Stewart).  They also seem determined to find the Cybermen... but for different reasons.

Soon, an ancient tomb is located in a craggy mountainside, and explosives are detonated at the entrance.  

Inside the ancient hive -- in a subterranean chamber -- rest the dormant Cybermen.  Klieg determines to awaken them at all costs.

Like juggernauts, the Cybermen eventually activate, emerge from their sleep cells, and promptly take captives, planning to transform Klieg into a new Cyberleader, and re-molding Toberman into an obedient cyborg.

Trapped in the lower level of the hive by a sealed hatch, the Cybermen send Cybermats to attack the Doctor and the survivors of the archaeological team…

First things first: “The Tomb of the Cybermen” is my all-time favorite Doctor Who serial. I've watched it probably a dozen times since the late nineties, and it was also my son Joel's introduction to Doctor Who.  

It's a ripping good yarn, and unlike many early Doctor Who serials -- which tend to get mired down in the tiring specifics of capture, chase, and rescue -- it moves with crisp efficiency and thematic clarity. 

I’m a big fan of Patrick Troughton’s Second Doctor because his iteration of the character possesses such fascinating levels or nuances.  There’s something mischievous and almost Loki-like about the Second Incarnation's approach to trouble, and nowhere in the canon is that idea plainer than in this 1967 serial.  

Throughout the tale, the Doctor seems to want to both avoid danger, and simultaneously bring danger on. He shuts down danger, and yet, at times, also nudges it forward, even helping Klieg solve an exceedingly-difficult puzzle in logic.  It’s as if The Doctor wants the Cybermen to wake up; like he wants to play that scenario out, even though he knows what terror may come from their presence 

I've always wondered if these contradictory impulses arise, simply, from the character's awareness of history. Perhaps The Doctor already knows the outcome of the Telos Expedition and that -- at this (fixed?) point in time -- the Cybermen must be awakened, and then, once more, brought to a stand-still.  He must, therefore, nudge history in the right direction.

Or conversely, is the Doctor just some kind of adrenalin junkie...someone who wishes to approach the flame as closely as possible, even at the risk of getting burned?  His behavior in this serial certainly points to someone who knowingly and intentionally flirts with danger.

Troughton’s Doctor is also exceedingly gentle in a way that Hartnell’s first incarnation was quite patently not, and this is a good thing.  It would be boring if all the Doctors were exactly the same, wouldn't it?  This sense of kindness and gentleness plays out in "The Tomb of the Cybermen" during a short scene with Victoria, in which the Doctor discusses with her his long-gone family. The Doctor states that his family memories "sleep" in his memory, and it's a touching character moment; one of the few references to the Doctor's life and background in the days before he fled Gallifrey.

My enduring appreciation for “The Tomb of the Cybermen” is due not only to the presence and charisma of Patrick Troughton but based on the fact that the serial by Kit Pedler and Gerry Davis lives up to a noble series convention.  

Specifically, it re-purposes and updates a genre or tradition outside of science fiction.  In particular, "The Tomb of the Cybermen" adapts a "Mummy Movie" template to the universe of Doctor Who. To wit:  a tomb is opened and a “curse” is awakened through the act of violation and transgression.  

The elastic Doctor Who format permits for and encourages frequent “pastiche” stories of this nature, and “Tomb of the Cyberman” adroitly transplants the conceits and tropes of the Universal Mummy movies of the 1940s to the alien world of Telos. 

In short order, we get the excavation of a buried tomb, meet the over-reaching scientist who can’t see the danger in opening Pandora’s Box, and of course, encounter the lumbering villains who awaken from the high-tech equivalent of sarcophagi.   

The most intriguing aspect of the serial’s narrative is that the “curse” of these Mummies -- these Cybermen -- is technological in nature rather than overtly supernatural. The Doctor and his cohorts are threatened by Cybermats, laser guns, hatches, training weaponry and the like rather than by collapsing tomb ceilings or other commonly seen booby traps of tomb adventures.  But the tale's point of attack is very similar.  "Modern" tomb raiders venture into sacred ground, into the world of civilization that has been dead for a very long time.  And, naturally, there is no real understanding of that dead culture, which makes the opening of the tomb infinitely more dangerous.

It must be established, as well, that “The Tomb of the Cybermen” is a really fun, really frightening serial.  The slow-moving, lumbering Cybermen make for a sinister, relentless presence, and it is an awesome sight to watch them push their way out of the giant honeycomb's cells.  They straighten-up to full size -- nearly seven feet tall -- and begin their merciless conquest.   

Honestly, I much prefer the Cybermen to the Daleks, and feel that they have always made for a more terrifying, more visceral threat.  In part this is because the Daleks will merely kill you.  The Cybermen want to use you.  There's still a part of you that is alive and aware inside that Cyber-suit, but your body is co-opted to a nefarious agenda.

The sense of terror generated by "Tomb of the Cybermen" also arises from the episode’s carefully-wrought sense of claustrophobia.  The serial was filmed economically on just five sets: the main control room, the doorway and mountain ridge, the target room, the energizer room, and the underground hive.   

Accordingly, there's the sense throughout the tale that there is absolutely nowhere to run.

For me, any celebration of sixty years of Doctor Who must absolutely recognize this 1967 serial, a high-point of the original run.

Doctor Who 60th Anniversary: "The Web Planet" (Hartnell)

In "The Web Planet," the TARDIS is unexpectedly dragged to the surface of the planet Vortis, and when the Doctor (William Hartnell) and his companions, Ian (William Russell), Barbara (Jacqueline Hill) and Vicki (Maureen O'Brien) investigate, they are surrounded by giant-like aliens known as “Zarbi.”

After escaping these insect creatures, the Doctor and his friends meet the kindly butterfly-like people of the planet, the Menoptera.  They once ruled the world, until the Zarbi fell under the influence of an evil life force known as “Animus.”

While plans are afoot for the Menoptera to re-take the planet from the Zarbi, the Doctor learns that Animus is housed at the center of the planet’s “magnetic pole” and is harnessing the energy of the planet to attract other energy sources, like the TARDIS. 

The Doctor is captured by Animus -- a sort of giant spider monster -- while Ian and the Menoptera hope to destroy the monster using a “living cell destructor.”

A tempting target for negative criticism because of its excessive duration (at six parts) and at times incomprehensible action, “The Web Planet” is one of Doctor Who’s most daring visual experiments.  

Although its ambition is greater than its often-faulty execution, “The Web Planet” is a stunningly-original serial in terms of design, and a good-faith attempt, at least, to create a truly alien environment on a TV budget.

Specifically, the Menoptera, the Zarbi, Animus, and the planetary landscape are all completely out-of-the-norm in terms of their designs, and therefore fully removed from the restrictions of our earthbound reality.  

Today, the effects, costumes, and make-up of "The Web Planet" may look silly or fake, but in terms of 1965 technology this show is just…crazy inventive. 

The surface of Vortis looks like the pock-marked moon, the Menoptera glide about on wires (!) and the Zarbi are created by men operating large insect-like exo-skeletons.  Again, the imagination on display here is simply staggering, even if the narrative is familiar: yet another "Time Machine Syndrome" tale of two cultures in seemingly perpetual conflict.

Again, I want to point out a neat visual flourish (or perhaps expedient...) seen in early Doctor Who.  Here, to provide the texture or feel of an alien world, the camera lens is smeared with some kind of jelly or Vaseline.  This affectation makes the visuals a little indistinct and a bit blurry, but also successfully creates -- literally -- an alien “air” to the fantastic world of Vortis.  

Today, digital effects can create creatures, landscapes, and atmospherics with relative ease, but in 1965, when “The Web Planet” aired, everything had to be constructed or devised for “in camera” execution. Every time I gaze at what was attempted here, on a TV schedule and budget, I'm astonished at the level of imagination on display.

Critic John Baxter wrote positively about “The Web Planet" in his book Science Fiction in The Cinema, commending "the brilliance of imagination that produced creatures like the Zarbi, ant-like monsters that preyed on humanoid butterflies in an Aubrey Beardsley catacomb of art nouveau screens." (A.S. Barnes Company, 1970, page 186).  

Baxter's comparison to Beardsley (1872 - 1898) is illuminating, as that artist was renowned for his use of black and white spaces and contrasts (a key element here, considering the surface and sky of Vortis). Beardsley is also remembered for his dark, twisted, macabre visions of the human form.  Although the artist's work tended towards the erotic and outrageous, one can see how the designers of "The Web Planet' re-purpose the human form towards similarly grotesque ends, vis-a-vis the costumes.

So -- yes -- there are better-written Hartnell serials out there, but“The Web Planet” is an experiment worth checking out purely because of its visual distinction..  The serial would be considered a greater success today if the story were more original, if some of the wire-work wasn’t so obvious to our better-trained eyes, and if the creature vocalizations were easier to understand.  But by my estimation, the problem with so much television programming is its utter, mind-numbering same-ness in terms of visualization and approach.

Love it or hate it, “The Web Planet” is like nothing else in Doctor Who, or in cult-TV history.  Sometimes an ambitious failure is a lot more fun to experience than a safe, utterly predictable "success."

40 Years Ago: The Hitchhiker (1983 - 1987)

Here’s a 1980s flashback: the HBO (later USA Network) horror anthology entitled The Hitchhiker (1983-1991). This long-running TV series commenced before the first Reagan term was over, and that epoch makes it an early example of the premium cable horror series (a trend pursued by HBO with Tales from The Crypt in the 1990s and later by Showtime with examples such as Masters of Horror and True Blood).

This new broadcasting venue meant that The Hitchhiker was free from the limiting restrictions and censorship of mass audience, basic network television. In other words, The Hitchhiker was willing and able to spotlight gory blood-letting, much nudity, and even simulated sex. It was a half-hour of soft-core porn and hardcore horror. 

No one had seen anything like it before.

As The Twilight Zone and Rod Serling’s Night Gallery established so dramatically in earlier decades, the anthology can be an excellent format for the horror genre. Since you get a new character every week, you’re able to kill off your lead if you so desire. That's a trick The X-Files or Kolchak: The Night Stalker, for instance, couldn’t get away with. Since your leads are always vulnerable in an anthology, there’s a heightened sense of vulnerability or unpredictability, and that's always good in horror. Throw in a little graphic violence and a pinch of sexy T & A and you’ve got yourself a real contender. 

At least that was the idea.

Our tour guide and narrator on The Hitchhiker was a mysterious wanderer with Miami Vice stubble, one who wore tight acid-wash jeans and thumbed his way across an endless desert road. Played by Nicholas Campbell and then Page Fletcher, this hitcher introduced each tale on the series, and then returned for a closing narration. The underlying conceit, which I quite like, is that we -- as viewers – symbolically "pick up" this enigmatic stranger on the highway and he regales us with a bizarre, frightening tale of the “road.” It’s kind of like a campfire story, but modernized to include a specter of modern life (the hitchhiker/stranger) and the isolation/alienation of endless highways, endless night drives. Quite spooky if you think about it.

In general, The Hitchhiker sought to tell horror stories in which -- in the great tradition of EC Comics – the scales of justice were balanced. Bad people were punished for their misdeeds. The universe boasted a sense of decency, even if some men did not.

The early installment “Night Shift,” (written by William Darrid and directed by Phillip Noyce), for example, involved a cruel nurse, Jane Reynolds (Margot Kidder), who worked the night shift at the Golden Age Nursing Home. This bitter, mean nurse ruled the old folks there with an “iron hand,” even going so far as to steal their prized jewelry so that she could sell it to her no-good boyfriend, Johnny (Stephen McHattie). But, as the Hitchhiker’s opening narration reminds viewers, this nurse learns that “some rules bend when the night shifts…”

Specifically, Jane's latest ward is “The Old Man” (Darren McGavin), an apparently comatose stranger who wears a very special ring. After Johnny and Jane attempt to steal it, the Old Man awakes and pursues them to get it back. Turns out the ring has a nasty blade embedded under the stone, one that is very efficient at slitting throats. The Old Man is actually a vampire you see, and before the tale is over he has hunted the cruel Jane and Johnny, draining them of their blood and youth, physically rendering them “old” like the very wards Jane so cavalierly abused.

At the coda of “Night Shift,” The Hitchhiker explains that “fate delivered an ancient evil to” Jane’s “doorstep” so that “the predator knows what it’s like to be the prey.”

Like most early episodes of The Hitchhiker, “Night Shift” is filmed extraordinarily well, relying on fine use of dramatic, well-composed close-ups and eerie lighting. When McGavin – the vampire – arrives at the nursing home, his room is bathed in an ethereal white light, one which seems to accentuate his age and suggest his immortality. And when Jane is hunted by the vampire in a storage closet, the light palette shifts to a terrifying, sickly green. It’s as though the institution – the nursing home itself – has turned against the transgressor.

Another HBO era story, “Last Scene” was written by Robert J. Avrech and directed by Robocop (1987) helmer Paul Verhoeven. It stars Peter Coyote as a desperate first-time movie director and former actor who has limited time and resources in which to help his wooden leading lady, Leda (La Gena Hart) develop the acting chops deemed necessary to sell the shocking final scene of his debut thriller. Coyote’s character goes to extreme and frightening lengths to terrify Leda and elicit a “real” reaction from the bad actress. The plan goes awry, however, and soon it’s the director who is learning about the nature of authentic terror.

As Page Fletcher's hitchhiker declares here, “the creatures created” by filmmakers “often have the last laugh.” 

Even during the HBO run, critics were not overly charmed by The Hitchhiker. Starlog admonished the series for using “gratuitous blood, gore and naked flesh in place of good scripts and solid performances.” (Starlog # 96, 1984-1985, page 35.) 

Meanwhile, The New York Times complained that “each episode becomes a game of guessing when an opportunity would be devised for the featured performers to take off all their clothes.” (John J. O’Connor, The New York Times, November 26, 1985, page C22.)

The reviewers weren’t necessarily wrong in this critique. The series indeed tended to exploit rather than authentically explore issues surrounding sexuality and sexual relationships. Many of The Hitchhiker episodes provided so-called eye candy thanks to guest stars including Kirstie Alley, Shannon Tweed, Helen Hunt, Karen Lynch, Ornella Muti, Virginia Madsen, and Karen Black -- thus satisfying prurient interest. Still, most of these shows aren’t genuinely sexy because sex is just a marketing tool of the producers; not a legitimate thematic undercurrent.

There were notable exceptions. In “Videodate, a womanizer named Rhodes (Gregg Henry) who ritually exploited women and even kept a bulletin board tally of his conquests, was bested by a sexy performance artist (Shannon Tweed) who played his game better than he did. The subject here truly was sex (and sexual sport/sexual dominance), and the ways in which every human being can be manipulated by his or her desire. Rhodes believed that he was a student of human nature, that he could push those buttons in others, but that he was somehow immune to it. In the end, he wasn’t; he was as much a slave (and a victim) as those he victimized. Again, not deep and not too original (another "moral" reiteration of the cosmic scales balanced cliche...) but still, overall, a…ahem…satisfying half-hour.

“Hired Help” was another quirky revenge story that succeeded based largely on its bizarre and daring sexual imagery. Here, another exploiter of fellow human beings (this time Karen Black, exploiting illegal immigrants) ends up unknowingly bedding down a Mexican devil or “Diablo” and is…er…put to Hell's service herself.

The centerpiece sex scene is spiky, sadistic and memorable. The scene is shot in silhouette, and during intercourse, the Devil Man unexpectedly sheds his human shape and sprouts demonic wings (not to mention glowing emerald eyes). Without warning, this devil – in media res, as it were – starts brutally man-handling Black, slapping her around with a belt (!) and contorting her compliant naked body,  What’s kinky about this sequence is, well, everything. Shakespeare it ain’t, but it sure keeps your attention. Even had they been inclined to include such odd sequences, anthology creators such as Hitchcock and Serling could not have gotten away with this sort of thing on broadcast television.

When The Hitchhiker went out on a limb and expressed the powerful notion that sex can be scary, dangerous and exciting, the imaginative imagery and subversive implications of the show's creators triumphed over often banal writing and trite plots. But these stories were the exception rather than the rule.

By the time that The Hitchhiker shifted over to the basic cable USA Network, it was in its fourth season. Unfortunately, that’s where things took a decided turn for the worse. The series could no longer get away with HBO levels of violence and sex, so the two trademarks of the anthology -- sex and gore -- were stripped away. 

And I mean totally stripped away.

Also, the entire production high-tailed it up to Canada (to cut costs), meaning that the series no longer featured movie star-caliber performers or directors. On USA, The Hitchhiker became a very bad, very dull potboiler with tepid twist endings that wouldn't surprise a four year old. At least the HBO edition stands as an interesting testimony to its context in the world and history of cable television: sex and violence were highlighted because they could be highlighted.

So if you're in a frisky, freaky mood, 40 years later, The Hitchhiker is certainly a fun horror anthology to re-visit. Just be certain you see the premium cable edition. The USA stuff is pure, G-rated dreck. 

Monsters of Thanksgiving

I have posted this story, or some variation of it, every Thanksgiving going back ten years now. Hard to believe. Perhaps it is a tradition of its own, after a fashion.

Looking back, I think the notion of a "monsterous" [sic] holiday film marathon is an experience that many "Monster Kids" and youngsters of the 1970's cherish and remember fondly. But, of course, the marathon is a reminder not only of monsters, but of family too, and of a specific time and place from our youth.

And, surely, this story is about how a memory of watching a film can color memories of families and holidays too.

Today, it is such a different world. 

Not necessarily better or worse. Just different. 

Today, we can put on any movie at any time, basically. We have options, and limitless possibilities via streaming. We can build our own marathon, specific to our family, on any day of the year. But the communal experience of enjoying of a film is something, perhaps that we have lost.  Or are in the process of losing.

When I was growing up in the New Jersey burbs during the seventies and early eighties, that communal idea of a holiday movie marathon, however, was thriving, especially, for some reason, with giant monster movies.

Every year, WOR Channel 9 would broadcast King Kong (1933), Son of Kong (1933) and Mighty Joe Young (1949) on Turkey Day.

Then, on Friday, the same station would host a Godzilla marathon consisting of such films as King Kong vs. Godzilla (1962), Godzilla vs. The Smog Monster (1971) and many others. Some years, if memory serves, War of the Gargantuas (1968) also played.  I'm sure that's how I first encountered the film.

I remember showering and dressing early on those Thanksgiving Days, so I could be lodged near the TV when the Kong movies started. 

Meanwhile, my Mom and Dad would be busy in the kitchen preparing a great meal of turkey, stuffing, baked carrots with cinnamon, and home-made biscuits. The house would fill with the aromas of the feast, and even downstairs in the basement rec room -- while glued to WOR-TV -- I could feel my appetite for dinner building.

Our guests, usually my grandparents and aunts and uncles, would arrive sometime in the early afternoon, around 1:00 pm and I would socialize with them, and then sneak back to the family room for more King Kong.  Sometimes my uncle Larry, a monster movie fan after a fashion (ironic?), would join me.

Dinner had multiple courses. My mom made her home-made French onion soup, which is a delicacy she still makes, 35+ years later, and which my 17 year old son Joel now enjoys.

Then the meal and dessert -- a chocolate cream pie and a pumpkin pie -- would be served, and we’d all enjoy each other’s company over the delicious food.

After an appropriate interval of visiting and socializing, I’d high-tail it once more back down the stairs to watch more of the movies. Others would matriculate in and out to see what was I watching, and we'd socialize more.

I’m certain my description of Thanksgiving makes it sound weird and anti-social, but you must remember that in the seventies, there were no VCRs (let alone DVRs or movie streaming), which meant that if you wanted to see a movie like King Kong, you had to seize your moment, or else wait for another year. 

I believe it took me the better part of four Thanksgivings to see all of King Kong, and then not even in chronological order. I actually saw the entirety of Son of Kong first, perhaps because it was often scheduled between our early afternoon dinner and dessert course.

This tradition of King Kong Thanksgiving and Godzilla Black Friday continued over a long period at my house -- the better part of a decade -- so much so that I still irrevocably associate the holiday season with WOR Channel 9 and its monster movie broadcasts.  

I still remember, a bit guiltily, forcing my parents to watch the 1970's Godzilla movies on Fridays, while we ate Thanksgiving leftovers in the family room. My folks liked the King Kong movies, but when it came to Japanese monster movies, they weren’t exactly big fans.  Today, my wife, son and I prefer the Godzilla movies.

Forty years or more have now passed since those Monster Thanksgivings in NJ. 

My grandparents are all gone. 

Many uncles and aunts are gone, or living in faraway states, and the monsters on TV no longer roar for hours on end. 

I am grateful my parents are still alive and of course, I'm happily married, raising a young adult of my own.  As a country, our national holidays, like Thanksgiving, seem fraught with different dangers in 2023. Such as? Discussing politics, rather than the fictional dangers of Godzilla stomping Tokyo...again.

In the span of history, these marathons happened for a few short years,  I guess. But I'll always remember those years, and the company of family and kaiju.  

I'm thankful for those years, and those friends, and for all of you too, reading these memories today. 

Happy Thanksgiving!

John and Jim's Excellent Journey #8!

Doctor James McLean and I continue our wide-ranging discussion of Star Trek and its history in our eighth "excellent journey" podcast.

30 Years Ago: Carlito's Way (1993)

"The street is watching. She is watching all the time."

-Carlito (Al Pacino), in Brian De Palma's Carlito's Way (1993) 

Al Pacino has portrayed more than his share of cinematic gangsters over the years, from Michael Corleone in Coppola's classic Godfather trilogy to the cocaine-addled Tony Montana in De Palma's own incendiary (and brilliant) Scarface (1983). 

Yet it is Pacino's Carlito Brigante, in Carlito's Way (1993), whom I personally find the most haunting. 

Perhaps that's because Montana was but a despicable thug who spiraled into utter madness and self-destructive violence. 

And the powerful Corleone was a man who had everything, but nonetheless permitted his paranoia, secrecy and quest for legitimacy to destroy the things and people he valued most.

Or perhaps it is because, of all of these flawed individuals, Carlito Brigante remains the one man who came nearest to authentic redemption; to escape. 

To a throwing off of the role destiny had so cruelly carved out for him. 

Viewing De Palma's Carlito's Way again, I realized that my enduring identification with Carlito or "Charlie" was no mere accident or happenstance. Director Brian De Palma has fashioned not simply another crime drama nor film noir here, but rather -- as he did in the example of The Untouchables (1987) -- a film of authentic mythic quality: a modern day variation on the Greek Tragedy, specifically as that term is defined by Aristotle in The Poetics. 

And -- since this is De Palma we're talking about -- the director vets his tragedy with dynamic, canny and meaningful imagery. 

Consider that Carlito Brigante dwells in a world of illusions and dreams: the world where he miraculously "gets out" and "escapes to paradise." Accordingly, in many important shots, De Palma utilizes reflections in mirrors to indicate that Carlito is no longer entirely part of the sleazy world he inhabits, but rather the world he dreams about. He is half-in and half-out of "the Street," and as we see, that's not a good place to dwell. Not until the end -- and his tragic death -- is escape actually tangible for Carlito; is paradise a colorful, living thing where he can, finally, truly, let down.

Once more, I appear to be in a small if vocal minority in my appreciation for a sterling De Palma film. 

Regarding Carlito's Way, Rolling Stone complained, for instance, that "there's a secondhand feel to the way this gangster movie delivers the goods." 

The Washington Post lamented: "Watching "Carlito's Way," all you can think is, "Brian, why aren't you over this gangsters and guns and blood stuff yet?"

Imagine -- just imagine for one second -- a film critic suggesting the same thing to director Martin Scorsese after Mean Streets, Good Fellas and Casino. 

Come on Marty, what's with all the gangsters, huh? 

Grow up, Scorsese, why don't you?

Many critics missed the boat with Carlito's Way. If viewed within the framework of Greek Tragedy, the film emerges as one of the best and most affecting gangster films ever produced. It concerns, literally, the full breadth of a gangster's "way." 

And how that "way" -- ultimately -- proves a fatal trap.

This Dream of Mine is So Close I Can Touch It

In accordance with film noir tradition, Carlito's Way commences with a voice-over narration. It is spoken by Carlito himself (Pacino), our main character, as he flashes back from his death bed (a paramedic's stretcher rolling through Grand Central Station...) to describe for the audience how he came to his untimely demise. 

The legendary Latino gangster reflects on the final year of his life: 1975. He was unexpectedly released from a prison sentence of thirty years duration due to prosecutorial malfeasance. 

His feisty, corrupt lawyer, David Kleinfeld (Sean Penn), was the man who arranged his freedom. And because Kleinfeld "saved" him in this fashion, Carlito feels he owes the slick attorney a huge debt.

Yet after five years in prison, Carlito no longer desires to return to the mean streets of the city as an "assassin" and "purveyor of Narcotics." 

He has gone straight...retired, and wants to chart a new, clean path. Among other things, he re-establishes his relationship with an aspiring dancer: the beautiful and sexy Gail (Penelope Anne Miller).

But fate has plans for Carlito. 

Soon after Brigante's release, David asks Carlito to oversee one of his floundering investments, a disco club called "El Paraiso," where the owner, Ron Saso is skimming money. Meanwhile, another thug -- the up-and-coming Benny Blanco (John Leguizamo) -- is desperate for Carlito's approbation. But after a violent altercation between Kleinfeld and Blanco, Carlito makes a mistake. Instead of killing the trouble-making Blanco, Carlito lets him go.

And then, finally, Kleinfeld manipulates Carlito into a half-backed scheme to exact revenge against a Mafia, family, the Taglialuccis. When that scheme turns to bloody, brutal murder, Carlito realizes his only chance for survival is escape. "You killed us," he tells David, realizing that the mob will now hunt him down.

With $75,000 dollars in savings, a desperate Carlito arranges to meet the pregnant Gail at Grand Central Station, where -- God willing -- they will board a train bound for Miami. From there, it's the Bahamas, and a new life. 

But en route to the train station, Carlito must contend with betrayal, theft, vicious pursuit, the Taglialuccis and an unseen enemy he had not counted on... 

Everything I Hoped For. Everything I Need

Aristotle defined "tragedy" as the tale of a great person who undergoes a dramatic reversal of fortune. 

In undergoing that reversal, that character's dilemma (and fate) evokes pity (meaning sympathy) and fear on the part of the audience until finally -- following the denouement -- there emerges a feeling of "cleansing" or catharsis. 

And importantly, the all-important reversal of fortune is affected by something called "hamartia," a Greek word meaning a character flaw or foible. 

This is a critical distinction: a hero's sad fate is rendered not because of the character's intrinsic moral defects, but because of a mistake, because of some wrong action undertaken. 

Eventually, in a good tragedy, the affected character comes to a final recognition about this wrong action, and experiences an epiphany about his existence; about destiny.and fate.

Let's consider Carlito's Way in light of Aristotle's definition of tragedy. 

Carlito is a "great person" indeed, especially in 20th century terms. He's a legendary gangster who once knew power, riches and fame. Carlito's reversal of fortune involves his arrest and incarceration. Going to jail changes Carlito in a critical way, and he loses a taste for the life that gave him "honor" and "glory" on the street. When he is released from jail, Carlito notes that he has been "re-born" (like the Watergaters, he says...) and that he desires to start fresh.

This is not a con, nor a lie...but fact. And yet trouble finds Carlito, first in a pool hall shoot-out, and then in his old associations coming back to haunt him. 

Still, in every meaningful way Carlito attempts to escape the pull of crime, the pull of the street. But then, one day, Carlito -- now half-out of the "street" -- makes a fatal mistake. He disrespects young Benny Blanco, a man described to Carlito (by Saso) as "you, twenty years ago." 

Then Carlito compounds that mistake by letting Blanco live following an altercation in the disco. At that moment (which De Palma's reveals in telling close-up), Blanco understands that Carlito's killer instinct is gone, and that he is ripe for the picking-off. 

Carlito is -- in the lingo of Blanco -- "over."

This mistake leads to Carlito's downfall and death. And certainly, this is where "fear" and "pity" both come into the picture.

 Let's tackle "pity" first. Gail is pregnant with Carlito's child. Carlito and Gail just want to escape the city with enough money to start a car rental business in the Bahamas. Yet Carlito can't let go of another mistake: repaying his "debt" to Kleinfeld. Gail notes in one scene that she knows exactly how this story will end, "how the dream will end:" With Carlito dead in an emergency room while she weeps over his lifeless body. Carlito's tragic end is thus predicted, and so we fear that the prophecy will come true.

De Palma generates "pity" or sympathy by devoting special care to the love story between Carlito and Gail. 

Critic Janet Maslin termed it "grandiose romanticism." And Zach Campbell at Slant Magazine noted that "the scenes between Carlito (Al Pacino) and Gail (Penelope Ann Miller) are touching and expertly calculated illustrations of deep-seated romantic feeling: rainy streets, late night coffee shops, dim apartments." 

In other words, we are meant to feel that this is more than a simple romance, but a love story for the ages. The love story befitting a "great person" like Carlito, king of thieves, and, in his own words, "The Last of the Mohicans."

The "fear" part of this Tragedy equation arrives in what is surely the greatest climactic set-piece of any De Palma film, and that's saying something, given the Odessa Steps in The Untouchables or the split-screen Prom massacre in Carrie [1976]. 

To the tune of "Lady Marmalade" first, -- and then some anxiety-provoking follow-up compositions from Patrick Doyle -- De Palma arranges a sustained, fever-pitched chase sequence. This set-piece takes Carlito from his bar to a train, to Grand Central Station, down an escalator, and onto a train platform. 

During this sequence, the camera is continually in motion, Carlito is constantly in motion, and even the trains are in continuous motion. Carlito grapples with the Taglialuccis, Saso's surprise theft of his money, a betrayal by Pachanga, and even an obese mafioso who functions as a kind of wild card; always lagging behind the other crooks as an unwitting but dangerous rear guard. 

Carlito attempts to elude his enemies at the train station, and De Palma artfully takes up his hero's stance with the camera: dodging, lunging, retreating, trailing, and cornering in what amounts to a breathless, nail-biting race. 

Carlito informs the audience in his voice over narration that he "is angling all over," and the same is undeniably true of De Palma's direction:.it is sterling, gorgeous and, indeed, fear-provoking. It's angling all over, lifting us like a tide into waves of tension and suspension.

This electrifying denouement is so brilliantly staged that we don't even recognize the looming danger (Benny Blanco) until it's too late. 

Like Carlito, we're sprinting to that finish line...to Gail -- in the distance -- waiting by the train. 

The first time we watch the film, we don't even notice that danger (Blanco) runs hand-in-hand with Carlito right up until shots are fired. 

And again, this is form deliberately echoing content. 

Carlito's tragic mistake was writing off Blanco; was not seeing and sensing the danger the young hood represented. De Palma grants us a deliberate visualization of that mistake in the seconds leading up to Carlito's fatal shooting.

In the end, after Carlito is shot, Gail's prophecy of doom is proved accurate, but in his dying instants, Carlito finds some small measure of peace; the catharsis or cleansing, of Aristotle's definition. A son (or daughter) will succeed Carlito, and -- hell -- he lasted longer than any of his colleagues thought possible. 

In this fateful moment, De Palma allows Carlito (and the audience), to catch a small glimpse of that evasive, elusive paradise: a travel poster hanging on the wall of Grand Central Station. The poster reads "Escape in Paradise" and it is the only image in the frame to be shot in living, vibrant color. Everything else is gloomy black and white.

Suddenly, the dancer rendered on that travel poster becomes Gail -- in Carlito's eyes -- and begins to spin...free. 

She starts to dance. 

A gorgeous sunset looms behind her, and as the movie ends, the lovers' theme song ("You Are So Beautiful") underscores the feeling that all is not lost, or hopeless. Gail (and her child) will go on with the $75,000.00 dollars. 

Carlito didn't escape the streets, but his child will. 

The cycle of poverty and violence that gave rise to Carlito and his mistakes will, finally, be shattered, in his progeny.

Didn't You Ever Have a Dream? If You Can't Get In, You Don't Get In...

De Palma provides us a number of visual indicators that Carlito dwells in a different world than the criminal associates who interact with him. 

For instance, as Carlito confronts the corrupt Saso early in the film, we see Carlito framed inside a mirror. And when Carlito deals with the treacherous Lalin (Viggo Mortensen) in his office -- again -- we see Carlito positioned inside the confines of mirror. This is a pervasive visual indicator that Carlito is "through walking on the wild side," just as he claims; that he is different from those men he still associates with. He is noble...they are not.

Finally, when Carlito allows his sense of "debt" to Kleinfeld to get the better of him, we again view Carlito framed in the mirror -- alongside Gail -- staring at himself. 

Angry over Gail's prediction of doom, he shatters the mirror with his fist. Carlito's destruction of the mirror (and his reflected image there) suggests that Carlito is no longer separate from the corruption of the Street (and from men like Lalin and Saso); that this venture with David (a prison break involving the Taglialucci's) will make him, again, a criminal.

It will be his undoing.

In other words, the "mirror" image represents the good world -- the place Carlito wishes to dwell...but can't. When Carlito visits Gail in her apartment, he gazes at her -- the madonna -- in a mirror too, meaning that she is part and parcel of that world he can't attain or keep. He is separated from Gail and that world, incidentally, by a door and a chain too...another obstacle blocking his entry to "paradise." 

Carlito's Way is dominated by brilliant and subtle visual touches such as these. 

For instance, on your next viewing pay attention to Benny Blanco's wardrobe and the way in which it changes and evolves each time he re-appears. At first, Benny seems a pretentious, unimportant clown (especially with the alliteration of his name: Benny Blanco from the Bronx!). Later, his wardrobe grows serious, as his threat to Carlito turns serious. And I also admire the way the film sets up Kleinfeld and Carlito on opposite/mirror reflection paths. Carlito is the gangster trying to go straight; Kleinfeld is the "straight" man (an attorney) becoming a gangster.

It's impossible not to be swept away in Carlito's tragedy. Even though his fateful ending is a foregone conclusion, you still find yourself rooting for his success. 

The most admirable quality about Carlito, perhaps, is that he never stops reaching for that better life. Unlike Montana or Corleone, Carlito's "way" doesn't involve killing people, peddling drugs or broaching robbery. His "way" to a better future is closer to our way -- keeping his nose clean, minding his own business and working hard. 

That's the American dream and that's Carlito's dream. In the end, that dream is something he's denied, and one composition in the film captures that failure. It features Carlito at war with gangsters, the American flag perched behind him on the wall. A study in contrasts: violence in the foreground; beauty and liberty in the background.

I suppose I identify with Carlito because he doesn't seek fame or power...he just wants to pursue personal happiness. De Palma's success in Carlito's Way is that he makes the audience identify with this gangster and his dream in a way uncommon for the bloody genre. Even Carlito's death brings about the pity of Aristotle's tragedy. "Sorry boys," Carlito tells the paramedics (in his mind), "all the stitches in the world can't sew me together again. Lay down... lay down."

And then, finally, Carlito contemplates Gail, the woman left behind. 

"No room in this city for big hearts like hers... Sorry baby, I tried the best I could, honest... Can't come with me on this trip."

It seems to me that more movie critics could have made room for a De Palma film like Carlito's Way.

One with a big heart.