Who Review: The Ultimate Foe
The Doctor has just presented evidence in his defense as he stands trial before the Time Lords on what was initially a charge of interference, but is now a charge of genocide. The change came about as a result of the Doctor’s evidence, which further confirms to the Doctor that the Matrix–the Gallifreyan database of all Time Lord knowledge and experience, and the source of the evidence–has been tampered with. The Valeyard, the Doctor’s accuser, thinks the Doctor’s just trying to make excuses. However, both are surprised when Mel and Sabalom Glitz turn up in the courtroom to confirm the Doctor’s side of the story. Indeed, Glitz fills in some of the gaps that had been edited out, casting the Time Lords themselves in a very bad light. Indeed, it seems the Time Lords are guilty of allowing Peri to die, and also of relocating Earth to hide the fact that secrets had been stolen from the Matrix, and to hinder their recovery (see “The Mysterious Planet”) . To confirm that the Matrix can be entered and manipulated, an old adversary of the Doctor appears on the Matrix screen, making claims about the Valeyard, his true nature, and his real intentions. But the Valeyard isn’t finished with his ultimate plan, as the trial turns from a battle in the courtroom to a chase through the mind-twisting virtual world of the Matrix, with the Doctor’s life on the line…
SPOILER ALERT!! My comments may (and likely will) contain spoilers for those that haven’t seen this serial. If you want to stay spoiler-free, please watch the story before you continue reading!
“The Ultimate Foe” is landmark Doctor Who for all the wrong reasons. Veteran Who writer, Robert Holmes, started out on the script, with the intention of wrapping up the whole “Trial” arc that he started with “The Mysterious Planet.” However, Holmes died before completing the task. Script editor Eric Saward, who had become close friends with Holmes, was reluctant for the story to be completed unless it was along the precise lines that Holmes had planned. Producer John Nathan-Turner didn’t like Holmes’s ending, which was the straw on the proverbial camel’s back for Saward, who resigned his position, taking Holmes’s script, leaving Nathan-Turner without a concluding episode. Enter Pip and Jane Baker, not the best Who writers by a long chalk, but certainly competent enough to write something that would at least tie things up. On a very tight schedule, and with very little material to use as background (they were legally prevented from reading what there was of Robert Holmes’s script for the last episode), they provided the concluding episode.
All that is to help us understand why these last two episodes are a bit of a mess. Ultimately, though, it doesn’t matter why. As with most creative ventures, the audience doesn’t care what it took to produce the end result. If the end result sucks, then that’s all there is to it. This story is, therefore, landmark because it was written under unusual pressure and politics, was half of Robert Holmes’s final story, and was the last to feature Colin Baker as the Doctor.
My biases really want to show with this story. Robert Holmes is one of my favorite Who writers–possibly favorite of all time–and I’m not a fan of Pip and Jane Baker’s writing. Not at all. So I want to say the first of these two episodes was sheer brilliance, but episode two sucked like grandma’s kisses. However, such is not the case. Clearly, Mr. Holmes was not at the peak of his powers when he penned this story, and Pip and Jane wrote to form, making this a story that could have been a blazing finale, but really ended up a bit of a mess, with a few things that make it bearable.
First, we have the question of motives. Why did the Valeyard go after the Doctor? Because the High Council of the Time Lords feared the Doctor would discover the fact that Matrix secrets had gone missing, and find out what they had done to cover this up. They offered the Valeyard the Doctor’s remaining regenerations in return for the Doctor’s successful conviction and execution. The Valeyard, who it seems is an amalgamation of all the evil in the Doctor, somewhere between his 12th and 13th regenerations, wants the Doctor dead so he could be free from the moral restraint of his goody-goody alter ego. And the best the Valeyard could do was put the Doctor on trial? In light of the fact that the Doctor has successfully beaten the Gallifreyan legal system twice before, and that the Time Lords have used the Doctor on more than one occasion to help defeat cosmic evil, it seems a bit lame that they would so easily conspire against him, and that they would do so on such a flimsy premise. After all, if the Doctor proves the Matrix evidence has been corrupted, then both his and the Valeyard’s evidence collapses. There would be no basis for a trial, and the Doctor would have to be found innocent of the charges. And I’m really not sure about the whole “amalgamation of the Doctor’s dark side” nonsense, though I think it gives the Valeyard a much stronger motive for seeing the Doctor dead.
I really struggle to see the point of the Master in this story. Sure, he summons Glitz and Mel, is the source of all the exposition about the Valeyard and the deal with the High Council, and shows the Matrix can be entered. But aside from that, he’s just along for the ride. Everything he does is just for exposition and hindrance. He says he thinks the Valeyard would be a stronger adversary than the Doctor, so he is more than happy to help the Doctor bring him down. The problem with this, though, is if the Doctor can bring down the Valeyard, doesn’t that make him the stronger adversary? And what makes the Master think the Doctor’s such a push-over? He has, so far, failed in every attempt to destroy the Doctor over the past fifteen years! I think the Master should be courting the Valeyard’s assistance, not trying to have him killed! In the end, the Master is nothing more to this story than a convenient plot device.
The last time we had an adventure in the Matrix was 10 years before, in Robert Holmes’s classic story, “The Deadly Assassin.” There, it was the scene of a battle to the death between the Doctor and his Time Lord adversary, sponsored by the Master. This time, the Matrix is the setting for a chase, with the Doctor hunting down the Valeyard so he can put an end to his devious machinations. Somehow the Valeyard has complete control over the Matrix environment, and though the Master has demonstrated an ability to access the Matrix, it seems he can’t put an end to it all by similarly manipulating the Matrix. I also wonder how come no-one in the High Council, like the Matrix Keeper, can put a stop to this? The Matrix is great when used appropriately. Here, it’s purpose is largely to pad the story. It doesn’t actually move the story along any further.
And then we get the final denouement between the Doctor and the Valeyard. The Valeyard has a device that will destroy Gallifrey from within the Matrix. The two fight as the Doctor tries to disarm the machine. Finally, he tells Mel to get back to the courtroom and have them turn off the Matrix screen to save their lives. Unfortunately, they can’t turn it off, but it’s okay. The Doctor manages to sabotage the Valeyard’s device, and it sends a feedback signal that hits the Valeyard. Why would turning off the Matrix screen have any effect? Wouldn’t that be like turning off your computer monitor when the box is about to explode–i.e., pointless? And wouldn’t this feedback signal be dangerous within the Matrix? After all, it seems to fire off all over the place. This just doesn’t seem very well thought through. Sure, Pip and Jane didn’t have a lot of time to come up with an ending, but for the viewer, that’s irrelevant. All we have is what we see.
When the dust settles, all charges against the Doctor are dropped. What’s more, it seems the Matrix tampering extended to include Peri’s ultimate fate. In reality she didn’t die, but went off with King Yrcanos to be his warrior queen. Nicola Bryant, the actress who played Peri, did not like this at all. And I have to agree. She and I both think the way Peri left, while unpleasant and shocking, was much better. Peri’s death at the end of “Mindwarp” helps make that story the best of the season, and probably one of the best Doctor Who stories of all time. I think revising that ending does a disservice to Philip Martin, and his excellent script.
“Not well thought through” pretty much sums up “The Ultimate Foe” for me. As an attempt to show the powers-that-be at the BBC that Doctor Who is still worth making, it’s pretty lame. You might want to watch this if you’re a die-hard fan, or if you’re a completist. But you might do better by making up your own ending.
