Worst Tom Baker story?

For me, I'd say 'The Keeper Of Traken' as I find it incredibly, incredibly, incredibly dull.

Other contenders (and there's really not that many) would be 'The Leisure Hive', 'Meglos', 'The Invasion Of Time' and 'Logopolis'.

Regards,

Cypher

I have five which vie:

Meglos, Underworld, The Armageddon Factor, Horns of Nimon and Invasion of Time.

The latter might have passed muster as a four-parter, but the fact that it completely cacked up the epic design legacy passed to it by Deadly Assassin would still do for it.

I'm not a Williams-era fan. I recognise there are Hinchcliffe ones which I'd call 'lesser gems' and there's also "Robot" under outgoing Barry Letts, but I just felt that era drifted away from my idea of "Doctor Who" exacerbated by the obvious budget problems (imposed from above and beyond) and the lead actor's ego.

G

For me, much of the joy of Tom Baker's time as the Doctor was Tom himself - most of the time, his charisma, his eccentricity and his personality would be enough to overcome duff special effects or dull scripts. Even when he was clearly in a bit of a strop (e.g. almost all of Season 18), there were moments of brilliance.

However, on those rare occasions when he clearly couldn't be bothered, a poor story would stick out like a sore thumb, and I am thinking mainly about the last ten episodes of the Key to Time season (Power of Kroll and Armageddon Factor), when the money was running out, the ideas were wearing thin, and Tom was clearly getting bored.

Thank God Douglas Adams was just around the corner then!

Beauty is in the eye, you know, but Sarah Jane was an all-time great.

Taking this thread slightly more in depth I think that (City Of Death Apart) that you could draw a line from Talons and probably find that most of the worst TB stories came after this line. The best TB era for me was the Hinchcliffe era.

Up to a point, but then Robot, Revenge of the Cybermen and The Android Invasion came before that line, while Horror of Fang Rock, The Ribos Operation and Full Circle (as well as City of Death) came after, so there was bad stuff before and good stuff after.

(Of course your opinions of these stories might differ from mine)

Image of the fendahl was probably the worse.

Others include Planet of evil and The Ribos Operation.

I must admit I've had a good laugh reading this thread.

Eh? They're two of the best in my opinion (not convinced by some of the effects in each, but that's another matter).

G

Generally, people say The Horns Of Nimon is pretty dire but actually I didn't think it was too bad. I'll go for The Leisure Hive as being the worst.

Erm...are you sure you're not mixing her up with someone else...?

I find The Horror Of Fang Rock quite bad.

Dare I say 'City Of Death'

For me a classic example of Tom Baker's sheer presence making something pretty awful more than bearable. IMHO

See also Keys To Time.



Horses for courses and all that.

The Armageddon Factor.

It has all the classic pitfalls of a six-parter, the worst of which is that is has just about enough story to last four parts. Dreary in the extreme.

"Rubbish" stories, "illogical" stories, stories with rubbish effects, monsters or acting ... all perfectly watchable from a DW perspective. Stories that are too serious or too silly ... fine. The worst thing DW can ever be is BORING. The Armageddon Factor is boring.

I thought that for a LONG time about "City of Death", and especially upon seeing it as a 15 year old in 1979 when it seemed a vehicle to indulge not just Tom, but Lalla and Douglas too, full of enforced zaniness.

In hindsight now though, I acknowledge it's a cut above the rest, but some aspects still grate.

G

[quote=digispec;6511520]"The Invisible Enemy" has to have some of the worst science of any Doctor Who serial. (A 'virus' that gets enlarged, but then looks like a prawn - ?!?)Quote]


The Invisible Enemy scared me witless, it was without doubt one of the scariest stories.

"CONTACT - HAS - BEEN - MADEEE"

And Leela in her sexy outfits

The Invisible Enemy is a guilty pleasure for me: the pre-cut piece of wall that falls over when K9 lasers it, the naff monster ... all wodnerfully crap. Michael Sheard is brilliant in the early scenes, full of terror as he is stalked round the spacestation.

I always have a bit of a problem with City of Death: the Doctor and Romana seem to be on the verge of a romantic relationshiop, and I feel very iffy about that. Catherine Schell is glorious, though, and Paris looks wonderful.

Nothing is worse than The Armageddon Factor ...

Meh, I like 'The Armageddon Factor', and, although I'm quite sensitive to overly-long stories, it didn't really drag for me. I guess the warmth of the Tom, Mary Tamm & K9 partnership kinda kept me glued.

Otherwise, I resoundingly agree with what you've said above.

Regards,

Cypher

Without doubt the last one where Tom Baker's Doctor dies & changes to Peter Davidson
don't remember the story title was it Logopilos? The Keeper of Traken was dire & Anthony Ainley as the Master not a patch on the late Great Roger Degardo.

I loved the Invisible Enemy that was really spooky.

The 'Key to Time' segment where he walked around with Ricicles and prickles all over him, looking like a mutant cactus.

Probably the point where he decided he was gonna leave...

I'm not sure about this. Barring City of Death, it's easy to argue that all of the 'classic' Tom Baker stories are from his first 4 series. And largely that's true. But, if you became a fan of the show during the Davison era then the final Tom Baker series isn't half bad.

That said, I recently rewatched The Leisure Hive and I couldn't believe they had almost 3 minutes of panning across Brighton beach before the episode actually began. It just shows how times have changed doesn't it

O man I love Horror of Fang Rock. Everyone dies! It's dark.

That'd be Meglos, a couple of seasons after the Key To Time, although, funnily enough, I seem to recall his departure was announced the week after the final episode of this story went out (or thereabouts ... they showed a clip from the final episode on the BBC news when they announced he was leaving).

Tom was my Doctor, I grew up with his stories, and just thinking about the period brings back warm nostalgic memories of dark Saturday evenings in winter. Having said that, Nightmare of Eden and Horns of Nimon are both pretty dire, watching them now (even as a Tom Baker fan, I think the "my arms! my legs! my everything!" section in Nightmare was Tom being allowed to go a bit too far) and I really hate the way that, after two wonderful episodes, the creepy atmosphere that The Stones of Blood has built up is ruined by the rubbishly uncreepy (and rather silly) last two episodes on the spaceship.

Apart from the overt humour that sometimes took over stories in the latter half of Tom's time on the programme, I think a lot of the badly-regarded stories are seen as such because of the low production values which, to a child at the time, didn't seem so obvious or such a problem, but are woefully apparent now we're watching them as adults. For example, The Creature From The Pit, while admittedly not the greatest story Doctor Who has ever produced, isn't the worst either, but I think much of its poor reputation rests on that embarrassing monster. And, what I said about the over-the-top humour in Nightmare notwithstanding, perhaps this story too would be almost watchable if the Mandrells didn't look so much like a cheap sketch show spoof of a Doctor Who monster. Perhaps ...

I agree, the Invasion of Time is pretty naff. For me it was the end of a great Tom Baker period of stories and characters.

Underworld?

G

Isn't that the name of the lingerie factory in Corrie!