The Underwater Menace: Episode 1

The Doctor (Patrick Troughton), Ben (Michael Craze), Polly (Anneke Wills) and newly acquired companion Jamie (Fraser Hines) materialise on a beach somewhere on Earth sometime in the near future and are promptly captured and taken to the legendary submerged kingdom of Atlantis, which Zaroff, a megalomaniacal scientist (Joseph Fürst), has promised to return to the surface but in fact has more insidious plans. Chapters 1 and 4 of this four-episode adventure are missing but animated reconstructions using the original audio tracts were released in 2023. 'Underwater Menace' is not one of the Doctor's better outings. The Atlanteans and their internal politics are simplistic and not very interesting, and Zaroff is a routine evil, gloating stereotype. Ben and Polly are serviceable companions and Jamie developed into a fan favorite but in this, his inaugural episode (after having been first encountered in now-lost 'The Highlanders'), the 18th-century Scotsman seems somewhat laissez-faire about the TARDIS, underwater civilisations, fish-people, and the future in general. The special effects are adequate (by early Who standards) but the script, especially the doctor's interactions with Zaroff is weak and the story is not that interesting (although the threat of Polly getting ichthy-ised is fun). The scenes of the 'fish-people' swimming together (obviously depending from cables over a dry 'underwater' set) has a strange charm and reminds me of similar scenes in Méliès early silent fantasy films. All-in-all, not great Whovian outing but still necessary viewing for fans. I applaud the attempts to resurrect the lost episodes whenever possible. *rating and comments pertain to all 4 original and/or recreated episodes.

This 4 part story has to go down as a major failure in the series history. It takes place on Atlantis and sadly it is silly and badly produced in most respects compared to the series usual great standards. Being quite ridiculous at times it is at best camp fun but it mostly fails to maintain that fun as it is also pretty boring much of the time. The attempts at humour often fall flat and its implausible story (from writer Geoffrey Orme) is not a good idea.

A disappointing adventure in almost every respect with only the regular cast's performances and a few small elements raising it above an Atlantis like descent into total awfulness. One of the worst Doctor Who stories but with just enough fun and decent aspects to keep it above the level of a lot of the dross you see on TV.

One word in its defence, many people accuse the villain Zaroff of having an awful accent but that was the actor Joseph Furst's own natural accent!

All 4 Episodes - 4/10

The TARDIS lands on the coast, the team try to work out where and when they are, before they are captured, and taken to a land under the sea, believed to be a myth.

The early parts of this are rather nice, it sees the team in their costumes from The Highlanders, and Jamie's early days in the TARDIS are very interesting, confusions about time, and The Scot's understanding.

Then the story begins.... it's pretty mild early on, and pretty forgivable, it would definitely decline in quality as it progressed, however on balance, this first part isn't bad.

I know it's missing, but I can imagine the scenes where the Doctors try to start operating on Polly are pretty scary.

The fish people though, I'm not a fan.

Joseph Fürst, he's quite tame here, give it time...

I'll be generous here, and give the opener a score of 6/10.