Paddy Russell, “Doctor Who: Invasion of the Dinosaurs” (1974)
That the eponymous beasties of the title of this Doctor Who adventure were so poorly realised visually, even on the TV serial’s notoriously underfunded budget, shouldn’t detract from this surprising political conspiracy thriller that critiques extreme idealism – in this case, eco-idealism – bordering on fanaticism that would seriously consider killing large numbers of people in order to achieve its utopian goals. Our heroes the Doctor (Jon Pertwee) and his new assistant, the investigative journalist Sarah Jane Smith (Elisabeth Sladen), arrive back in early 1970s central London in the TARDIS to discover the city all but abandoned, inhabited only by looters. After falling foul of the law and being arrested as looters themselves – and while being transported to a detention centre, witnessing an attack by (of all things) a giant dinosaur, the two are reunited with UNIT and Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart (Nicholas Courtney), who explains to them that the city is being menaced by dinosaurs that apparently come and go, as if by magic.
On carrying out their own investigations – and narrowly escaping being chomped down by a saurian monster or two – the Doctor and Sarah determine that a conspiracy being run by two scientists, Whitaker and Butler, is bringing the prehistoric beasties to London using Timescoop technology as part of a plan to rid London of people and repopulate the city with a group of chosen individuals currently residing in an underground bunker which those people have been told is a spaceship. A new Golden Age is supposed to follow, one close to nature and free of industrialisation with its pollution and overpopulation, and the environmental and social evils those phenomena supposedly brought. What’s more, the conspiracy not only includes a prominent Cabinet Minister in charge of the evacuation emergency and a major Army general, it also involves a senior member of UNIT, Captain Mike Yates (Richard Franklin), sabotaging whatever the Doctor does to try to understand the dinosaurs and where they are coming from.
The story is fairly well told, though there are the usual pacing issues in the six-part serial format, with slow action in its middle section and the story speeding up in the last episode to a hasty conclusion with rather glib and unimaginative moralising on the Doctor’s part that people must work to improve society, not overthrow it (and kill millions while doing so) to bring about a new, revolutionary society. There’s not much character development and one needs to have seen previous Doctor Who adventure “The Green Death” to know why Captain Yates has gone rogue and is prepared to shoot the people he was once proud to work with. The Brigadier and Sergeant Benton (John Levene) are little more than the usual military-men stereotypes, dedicated to serving Queen and Country in spite of their better judgement. At least the Brigadier shows some mercy to Yates in putting him on sick leave and offering the misguided captain the chance to resign from UNIT quietly.
Perhaps the best thing to be said about “Invasion …” is its critique of idealism and how easily idealists can become fanatical in achieving their goals, to the point where they will not tolerate other opinions and points of view, and will resort to shutting down those who challenge them … even carrying out mass murder and repressive actions. Returning to a pastoral, Romantic Golden Age, free of environmental pollution and destruction, and the social and cultural ills of capitalism and industrialisation, may seem a wonderful idea but the fact that, in “Invasion …”, this notion is supported by people representing the political and military elite in Britain, gives the idea an unsavoury feudalistic edge.