Doctor Who: The Creature from the Pit (Story 106)

At four episodes a thin story is over-stretched, the finale seems tacked on, and the shoddy creature effects are more remarkably phallic than anything in the same year's theatrical release, Alien. On the plus side, Lalla Ward in her third story grows nicely into her role as Romana, David Brierley takes over from John Leeson as the voice of robot dog K-9, and the set design and costumes are well up to the show's late-'70s high standards. Not a patch on the immediately preceding "City of Death," but an entertaining Whovian pantomime nonetheless. --Gary S. Dalkin

Product Description
On the planet Chloris, metal is scarce, and without metal for tools, it is impossible to keep the planet's fecund jungle under control. When the TARDIS is forced to make an emergency landing on Chloris, the Doctor is captured by the power-hungry Lady Adrasta, who controls the very last metal mine on the planet, holding onto power through her Huntsmen and Wolfweeds. Romana is taken prisoner by rebel bandits, looking for some way of getting their hands on Adrasta's wealth. If K9 had feelings, he would have much to fear. Made of metal, he is a valuable commodity indeed. As if the situation were not bad enough, something is lurking in the pit of the last mine.

The Doctor and Romana respond to a distress call on Chloris, where they are caught up in Lady Adrasta's dictatorial ways. On Chloris, metal is needed to contain the increasingly fecund jungle. Adrasta has the monopoly on metal--she owns the only mine, and that is the source of her power. She also employs the service of the Huntsman and his band of Wolf Weeds, which resemble green tumbleweeds. However, there are some rebels under Torvin, former miners, who are staging ambushes to steal anything metal.

The Doctor meets Organon, Adrasta's former astrologer, a bearded talkative soul who introduces himself thus: "astrologer extraordinaire, seer to princes and emperors. The future foretold, the past explained, the present apologized for." Together in the pit, they discover the nature of the title creature, which is huge and glows an eerie green colour.

Myra Frances plays Adrasta as a cruel despot--she even slaps Romana in one scene! Eileen Way, who is Karela, Adrasta's vizier, appeared in the very first Doctor Who story as the Old Mother. Karela is indeed someone just as ambitious and cruel as her mistress. Geoffrey Bayldon is good as the chatty but clearly sign-obsessed Organon. However, John Bryans plays Torvin as a hammy East London Jew, complete with accents and bushy beard: "My beautiful boys," he calls his subordinates, who are just as hirsute and bearded as he.

The Doctor has a funny line when he asks Adrasta to spare Doran, a court engineer-scientist who displeased her: "He may be an idiot, but he is a conscientious idiot, and engineers are hard to come by."

Romana's aristocratic bearing is apparent when she is captured by Torvin and his rebels. She is hardly scared when they threaten to kill her. Indeed, she keeps calm until K9 comes along, and then walks off. Dressed in her white robe, it's no wonder, as Lalla Ward's full name is Lady Sarah Ward, who is the daughter of Lord Bangor (Edward Ward). Ward really plays it straight here.

Some of Douglas Adams' silly humour is apparent in the story following the classic The City Of Death. One of the funniest moments involves the Doctor who's clinging along the side of the pit and is reading a book on mountain climbing, only to find out the book is in Tibetan. He then pulls out a book, Teach Yourself Tibetan. Unfortunately, it's established in other stories that the Doctor already knows Tibetan, so either the book is highly technical or this was just a scene done for laughs. And when going through some of the Doctor's old junk, Romana asks him if he really needs the jawbone of an a**, to which the Doctor retorts, "Don't be a philistine." That's a biblical joke, for those who don't get it.

Not a bad story, but seeing as how this came after the top-rated City Of Death, something of a comedown.


"And with her, die the dark ages for this planet..."   July 9, 2003
Huntsmæñus (New Orleans, La)
5 out of 5 found this review helpful

Landing on the planet Chloris, the Doctor and Romana discover a giant egg shell-like structure in the middle of an overgrown forest. They later find out that the planet Chloris is low on metal and has an over abundance of foliage, and the completely insane and greedy Lady Adrasta has a hidden agenda and a hidden horror trapped in a pit! The Creature From the Pit is another silly installment from Season 17, where humor and sillieness is rampant, and production values have dropped. But apart from Erato himself, the production of this underrated serial is very good. The forests scenes are very well realised on film. Tom Baker excells in one of his funniest outings. Line after line after line! Geoffrey Balydon as Organon, Court Astrologer, is another highlight in an amusing role. And David Brierley filling this season as the voice of K-9 gives him some humor, as well. Though, Tom Baker's communication with Erato for the first time is very phallic indeed! There's a reason why there's so much sillieness. David Fisher's scripts are filled with great Tom humor and Douglas Adams' script editing gives it that final absurdity. Though most discriminating Who fans might not give this serial the time of day, it is surprisingly enjoyable. Especially with a few bottles of beer!


Season 17 creaks on...   July 18, 2010
Byron (Fort Lauderdale, FL)
1 out of 2 found this review helpful

I was going to lay off this one since I've given my opinion on the other season 17 monstrosities but since Amazon went out of their way to invite me to review it, here we go....
As I've stated before, in my opinion (and many others') season 17 was one of the worst seasons of Doctor Who and definitely the worst of the otherwise excellent Tom Baker. The only truly good story was City of Death Doctor Who: City of Death (Story 105). The rest of the stories from that year ranged from shoddy to god-awful. Creature from the Pit is not the worst of these (Horns of Nimon wins that prize, closely followed by Destiny of the Daleks) but it's not really good either. Production values are poor (even by Who standards) and Tom Baker is let off the leash to over-indulge in silliness and over-the-top breaking of the fourth wall. The fabulous Douglas Adams was the script editor and managed to keep it under control and focused for the story he penned (City of Death) but pretty much everything else in that season devolved into intentional and self-mocking "look at me, I know this is ridiculous!" camp (the worst kind).
If you are already a Doctor Who fan and have a firm grounding in the show, you may want to look at this just to see what the fuss is about but you may regret actually having paid to do so.

NOTE TO AMAZON---This review was actually written on 8/20/10. I'm not sure why the date of July 17th is attached