Doctor Who - The Visitation [1963]

Amazon.co.uk Review

Doctor Who: The Visitation is a routine adventure from the show's 19th season, beginning with Peter Davison's Fifth Doctor trying to return air hostess Tegan (Janet Fielding) to Heathrow Airport but materialising the TARDIS just as the Plague is ravaging 17th-century England. Three stranded Terileptils (humanoid-reptilian-fish hybrids in laughable costumes) are planning to wipe out humanity, while the local population have accepted the invader's puzzlingly camp robot for the Grim Reaper incarnate. There's much running around, being imprisoned and escaping again, but little substance in the story bar a return to the original series concept of tying the plot to elements of real history. Trying to find something for all the companions to do stretches the material thin, with the best entertainment coming from Michael Robbins' memorable turn as Richard Mace, an out-of-work actor turned charmingly genial highwayman. The "surprise" ending is predictable, Matthew Waterhouse's Adric as earnestly tiresome as ever and Tegan still tediously grumpy. Sarah Sutton as Nyssa is left too long building a sonic weapon which can vibrate a robot to pieces but doesn't harm the TARDIS or herself, yet Davison goes a long way to redeeming the tale with a charismatic intensity the yarn just doesn't deserve.

On the DVD: Doctor Who: The Visitation is presented in the original 4:3 aspect ratio with a good if variable picture. There are numerous unavoidable light trails on the video-shot studio material and some visual distortion on a few scenes. The mono sound is good and extends to an optional isolated presentation of Paddy Kingsland's musical score, a feature complemented by a new 16-minute interview with the composer by fellow Who musician, Mark Ayres. Of greater general interest is a 26-minute reminiscence by director Peter Moffatt covering all the six Doctor Who adventures he helmed. There is a good feature on Eric Saward and on the writing of the show, five minutes of extraordinarily dull Film Trims, detailed Information Text and an automated photo gallery. There are subtitles for both the episodes and a commentary that finds Peter Davison, Janet Fielding, Peter Moffatt, Sarah Sutton and Matthew Waterhouse having great fun bantering their way through the four episodes, a feature that proves far more enjoyable than the serial itself. --Gary S Dalkin

Customer Reviews:

Highly Enjoyable.......2007-02-27

The Doctor, Tegan, Nyssa & Adric land in 1666 (instead of 1982 to return Tegan home). In a village they find new technology, impossible to originate from earth. The Doctor then stumbles on mind controlling devices, an android disguised as death and a Terileptil prisoner, whose ship blew up in the atmosphere.

Despite an unbelievably slow Part 1, Parts 2-4 are brilliant and highly exciting on the otherhand, going incredibly quickly and unbelievably enjoyable

Death stalks the woodsy woods of Heathrow, 1666.......2006-07-15

Story: 4/5 - Extras: 4/5

"The Visitation", by Eric Saward, is an old school "Doctor Who" story. Relatively sedately paced with lots of location filming in damp-looking woodlands, and conforming to the classic pseudo-historical formula of an alien force invading superstitious pre-industrial Earth, "The Visitation" hardly pushes the boundaries of 1980s television, but it does provide a relatively moody tale that takes advantage of the major event of the era (the Great Plague) in true historical style, and even offers a cheeky explanation for the Great Fire of London.
For the four episodes that constitute "The Visitation", the regular crew of the Doctor, Tegan, Nyssa and Adric (as if the TARDIS wasn't crowded enough already) are joined by gentleman of the road and sometime thespian Richard Mace, played in true OTT style by actor Michael Robbins, and as a result the story is positively bloated with foreground characters. However, given this challenge, writer Eric Saward manages remarkably well to give them all something to do. Much as in "Earthshock", Nyssa spends a certain amount of time hanging around in the TARDIS towards the end of the story, but at least this time it's for a reason.
The principal monsters of the piece - the reptilian Terileptils and their jewel-encrusted android - are pretty well realised given the era and the budget, there's a nice introductory sequence to set the scene, a distinctive score and a whimsical closing shot that doesn't quite make you cringe. Overall, "The Visitation" is an enjoyable little story.
On the DVD, there's a raucous commentary with the full TARDIS crew plus director Peter Moffatt. It's fun, although they do get a little carried away from time to time in slagging off actor Michael Robbins. Beyond the commentary and the usual on-screen production notes, a few original featurettes are thrown in to make up a reasonable DVD package.

Another worthy DVD release........2005-09-06

The Visitation is in my opinion a much underrated story. Peter Davisons fifth doctor tries to take Tegan back to Heathrow in order for her to return to the flight she was supposed to be on before joining the Doctor. The TARDIS however ends up in 1666. 300 years before Heathrow was built. The Doctor and his companions then get caught up in a plot by three fugitive tereliptils and their 'grim reaper' android.
This is an enjoyable adventure with convincing monsters [apart from the tights they wear] and top performances particuarly from Davison and Michael Robbins who plays out of work actor Richard Mace.
This is worth a DVD despite what many may say and despite its flaws it is a good DOCTOR WHO adventure.

Suprisingly Good.......2005-06-27

In my opinion this story is the classic example of a romp, ie not excellent and not rubbish yet its a shade above average and very watchable. Watching this story its easy to see it has a lot going for it, the historic period, very good guest character, good villian/monster and a Doctor in Peter Davison on very good form. In fact watching it he bounds around the story clearly enjoying himself - the story is after reading the script he was really up for this, in fact if it wasn't for the quite frankly dull directing this story could be one of the great Who stories. I'm not going to go into the extra's in detail as bar the highly enjoyable commentary they are rather dull (focussing on the director ironically). In saying that this is an example of Who doing what it does well and is worth watching for The Doctors interaction with Richard Mace (guest character) alone. The descriptions best aimed for it are charming and enjoyable, it gets 4 stars from me but don't expect to see anything special in this one.

Well-made but formulaic story.......2004-08-10

First off, compared to the average Who story The Visitation is very well made - the direction is good, the design work is fantastic (the only serial this designer worked on - did he overspend I wonder?) - the two main supporting guest stars - Richard Mace as the wonderfully over the top thespian highwayman and Michael Melia acting his socks off as the Tereleptil leader - are excellent, and the design of the Tereleptil leader's head, complete with animatronic lips and moving gills, is one of the best realised monster costumes in the series history.

Where the story fails to come alive is the script. It's functional, and there are no gaping plot holes, but it's a very basic and formulaic story. Writer Eric Saward himself admits as much on the supplementary DVD extra material, explaining that he was working from memories of old Doctor Who TV stories he'd seen as a kid and was simply trying to replicate them. The Tereleptils are magnificently designed, but beyond being lizards there's nothing particularly interesting about them in the script - and if it comes to 'stranded aliens decide to take over the Earth' stories it's hard to see anybody choosing this above the likes of Terror of the Zygons (for example). Saward also struggles with the over-populated TARDIS - Tegan and Adric just about get enough things to do, but Nyssa gets pushed aside into a terribly basic and undramatic weapons building exercise that takes up nearly two episodes. Thank god for Richard Mace - while it becomes clear on the audio commentary that the regulars didn't think much of his performance he at least injects some life and comedy into an otherwise functional but dull story.

On the extras front the audio commentary is the most entertaining, with Peter Davison, Sarah Sutton, Matthew Waterhouse & Janet Fielding typically taking the mickey out of the show and each other. Mini features on the director, author and incidental music composer are also typical of the care that the BBC lavish on even the most average of stories.

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