Don a Stetson & pull yourself up a seat in the saloon bar, boys & girls- we're off to the Wild West for The Dodo, The Astronaut & The Elderly! Or should that be The Gunfighters? As well as being the penultimate entry in the run of Hartnell's Historicals ( before a meeting with some pirates in The Smugglers), this is notable in that old Bill himself suggested the setting- perhaps compensation for the rejection of his earlier idea The Son Of Doctor Who, an attempt to expand on the Time Lord's familial ties.
Just to add to
the Western atmosphere, set a little Ennio Morricone playing in the background.
Savour what must be among the great Italian film composer's work and
read on. After their escape from the Celestial Toymaker ( The
Celestial Toymaker), the First
is complaining of toothache. ' It could have been worse', his
companions might console him. ' The TV Lords considered sentencing
you to a quick change of appearance mid-game a little while back!'.
Might not have
come as even a sliver of comfort to the Doctor that he's escaped for
now though. Damn those troublesome gnashers! Steven & Dodo are
overjoyed to find themselves in this corner of time & space
though, & rush off to change into what appears to be surplus '
cowboy' stock from a local fancy dress shop. Their Time Lord friend &
protector is still more interested in his teeth, though. Is the Wild
West really the best place to find a dentist?
The Clanton
brothers want a man who sounds like he should be a health
professional too- Ike, Phineas & Billy are out for revenge on Doc
Holliday for the killing of their brother Reuben. Turns out the Doc
is actually a dentist after all on the side as well.
Fancy that. His
CV also reads ' gambler & gunfighter' as well as ' tooth yanker'-
what a guy. Steven jokily suggests that he's 'the fastest gun in the
west', which is overheard by a rather famous Marshall- no less than
Wyatt Earp. If you hadn't guessed where we are yet, you might now!
Its Tombstone, Arizona..
All of which will
come in handy the next time the Doctor finds himself on similar
ground ( A Town Called Mercy)
attempting to reason with the Gunslinger. Partly on account of being
a near unstoppable cyborg, he could probably have both Earp &
Holliday for breakfast in a gun duel. That & the fact he's got a
laser cannon for an arm...
Of course, writer
Donald Cotton has forgotten something. Where here Holliday & Earp
are presented as fugitive & lawman respectively, they were
actually allies- Holliday saving Earp's life in 1878 shortly after
Wyatt had moved to Texas from Kansas. Never let the facts get in the
way of a good story, hmm? Steven is taken into custody for his own
protection & presumably learns to play harmonica while he's at
it. Somebody else heard the whole thing too- the Doc's lady friend
Kate Fisher, a singer in the Last Chance Saloon! Why give a bar such
a name, you may ask.
Well, often such
places were indeed the last chance for anyone passing into a state
where alcohol was prohibited to stop in & have a drink. No wonder
they proved so popular & indeed passed into common metaphorical
usage, eh? By the time the First & his friends arrive there, the
Doctor's concocted a brilliant cover story for them all- he's Doctor
Caligari, part of a travelling band alongside his pianist Dodo Dupont
& singer Steven Regret- as in ' once they hear him sing they'll
wish they hadn't'. And they should know, probably having heard him
warbling in the TARDIS shower more than once.
Two incarnations
later of course the Doctor who doesn't like to be referred to as '
Doc' will take opera as his own preferred showery sing-along.
In case you're wondering, he's exercising his vocal cords to La
donna e mobile, from Rigoletto.
Whether he was there with Verdi at any stage in the writing process
or attended the première of the work in 1851 isn't known. For now
though, he's got to show off his own musical skill- to a higher
standard than his lyre playing in The Romans,
of course. He might have got away with it in front of Emperor Nero
but somehow an audience of drunken cowboys might not be so agreeable.
First things first though. Its time to fix his tooth!
At first, having
seen the ramshackle condition of the place he's reluctant to go in
like millions of people terrified of a trip to the dentist. But
having been encouraged by Ms Chaplet, who says he'll get a sticker &
maybe even a lollipop for being a big brave boy, he enters to find
the other Doc & Kate in a romantic clinch. Seeing it as an excuse
to leave post-haste, he offers to leave them to it. But Holliday's
overjoyed to have a first client of the day & bids him to sit
down with the offer of either booze or a knock-out punch by way of an
easy anaesthetic.
His friends are
busily trying to book rooms for the travelling party at the Saloon (
the First's been saving up vouchers) & sign themselves in under
their singer & pianist aliases. Which pleases the bar owner,
Charlie- his last piano player got himself shot & so is unable to
play. Unable to get Elton John at short notice, his problem will be
resolved following a monumental mix-up between Docs that results in
the Clantons thinking the man in the smoking jacket & Stetson is
Holliday. Back at the bar, Steven & Dodo are quickly forced to
think on their feet!
Having quickly
scrapped a plan to really show off by playing an arrangement of
Knights Of Cydonia or anything from the fruitful collaborations between Morricone &
Sergio Leone, they improvise The Ballad Of The Last Chance
Saloon...
It could be the last song the Doctor ever hears, at least in this old body- as he approaches the Saloon it looks like he might be about to breathe his last. Holliday's too busy gloating over his stroke of luck in avoiding such a fate himself to notice that Kate's gone off to warn the First, who'll be gutted his colleagues didn't at least consult him before nay-saying Cydonia.
It could be the last song the Doctor ever hears, at least in this old body- as he approaches the Saloon it looks like he might be about to breathe his last. Holliday's too busy gloating over his stroke of luck in avoiding such a fate himself to notice that Kate's gone off to warn the First, who'll be gutted his colleagues didn't at least consult him before nay-saying Cydonia.
He didn't nip to
1954 & help Leo Fender design the Stratocaster for nothing, you
know. That & the hours spent learning every note wasted, though
he does at least now have a tasty stockpile of guitars for future
jams. His Third incarnation might want to have a bash before he goes
off to Devil's End, say, or the Tenth upon finding himself in The Satan Pit.
Back at the West, though, & Kate has eased Dodo off the piano in
an effort to distract what might be termed cowboys from hell.
Dodo takes it completely the wrong way, though.
Firstly, she
hates Pantera. Secondly, how dare Kate muscle in on Steven? The
Doctor is escorted out by Masterson following a bit of a set-to with
the rowdy cowboys, which upsets Dodo greatly. He'll never survive in
prison, will he? The Clantons & their posse will be appeased,
though- they'll think Holliday's under lock & key. Earp, who's in
on the plan, goes to find out where the real Doc is. Steven, with the
aid of some sympathetic Saloon regulars, finds himself the unwitting
organiser of a prison break to free the Doctor.....
The Clantons have
their own supporters, though, leading to a stand-off! It's at this
point that another great outlaw, Johnny Ringo, is introduced. Pa
Clanton wants to use him as a hired gun in their vendetta against
Holliday..History records that such an affiliation did indeed happen,
but not in this particular feud. In this case though, Johnny was to
have been played by one Patrick Troughton, who proved to be too busy
to take the role but would have quite another come the ending of The Tenth Planet.
Its impossible to tell now how Pat would have played the part, of
course.
But the man who
does here, Laurence Payne, does a brilliant job of turning Ringo into
the prime exponent of the ' be quick or be dead' philosophy. Arriving
at the Saloon, he tells Charlie that he too wants to snuff out
Holliday- but strictly on his own terms. ' I won't tell anyone' says
Charlie. Ringo agrees with him, then shoots him just in case he
decides to go back on his word. We're now coming up to a certain
famous gunfight at the OK Corral!
Which means
precious few survivors. Mercifully for the Doctor's long-term future,
'Johnny Ringo' isn't an alias adopted by his next self. If it had
been there's a high possibility that an awful lot of regenerations
would be happening at high speed, with little time for each new
incarnation to get used to the whole ' living' thing. And besides which, when was
the last time you saw an outlaw with a recorder?
The day will come
when the Doctor will proclaim Stetsons 'cool' & have a go at
being a Marshal himself.
He'll even help a horse explain its lifestyle choice.
But The Gunfighters is
where the West began for the Time Lord, an age before he praised his
headgear. There's no denying it's worth it on this occasion, though!
