So this is how it all began, and the first thing to say about the first ever Dr. Who serial is WOW is that theme tune and opening weird! and AWESOME! and so so odd. It must have sounded even stranger to an audience back in 1963, crowding around their black and white sets to see the new family entertainment show on the BBC. One of my major gripes with the revitalised series has been the destruction of the theme tune. By turning it into just another orchestral score it has lost that eerie quality that is so evident in the earlier versions.
On to the story then. Two teachers (played by William Russell and Jacqueline Hil) can’t understand why their student Susan (Carol Ann Ford) seems so knowledgeable about things she hasn’t been taught and can’t possibly know. They opt to follow her home, only to discover she seems to live in a junk yard with a secretive old man who claims to be her grandfather. Before long all 4 have been transported in a police box that turns out to be a spaceship called the TARDIS to another world where they are imprisoned by primitive humanoids and caught up in their tribal power struggles.
It’s clear from this serial that there is not a clearly formed idea for the show yet. The pilot episode in particular seems to be aiming for a historical/educational show where the travellers (one of them a history teacher) will go with their student to different times and learn about the past. The story is only nominally set on another world, it could easily have been set on prehistoric earth.
It’s also strange to see Hartnell’s characterisation of The Doctor. We have become so used to seeing The Doctor as a know-it-all, with such vast acquired knowledge from his centuries of travelling, whereas here he is only just beginning his journeys and while he is eager to learn about everything he doesn’t seem to have a lot of experience or knowledge of other worlds to fall back on. This is not the Doctor you look to to get you out of a scrape with some brilliant piece of ingenuity; indeed the roles are somewhat reversed and he is more likely to blunder into and need the help of his companions to save him. That said, this Doctor has not developed the love of companionship either; he would much rather be travelling alone and makes that clear, despite repeatedly relying on his younger companions. I also never knew he had a granddaughter and am curious to see what happens to Susan as the Doctor’s story arc unfolds.
In terms of format, the 25min episodes work well, as do the cliffhangers and overall this seemed a well-paced bit of TV drama, nowhere near as dated as I had been expecting. Definitely an idea and set of characters still finding its feet, An Unearthly Child was nevertheless an absorbing start to the great journey.
Next: The Daleks!