Great direction, good performances, nice sets and costumes.
This could have been silly.. we're only 4 stories from "the Hoons of Nimon" after all... but has some dramatic credibility. (The scene where the Doctor and Romana discuss the vampire war, and the bit where the Doctor finds out about bowships are stonkingly good.)
Impressive debuts for Peter Moffat and Paddy Kingsland (apart from Meglos p1 which was produced after this anyway).
Terrance's script for the Vampire Mutations had a worryingly long gestation but the story came out ok and only has nitpick level faults. (eg. Aukon talks about breeding dullness into 20 generations of peasants on 1 page and 1000 years of feudalism on others.)
Emrys James (noted RSC actor), Rachel Davies (long TV career including the terrifying misandrist Mrs Malcolm in Cracker - Men Should Weep) and William Lindsay (Captain in Blakes 7 - Animals) were all very good as the Witch Lord Vampire set Three Who Rule. Easily the best non-meta DW villains since Magnus Greel. (Scaroth and The Pirate Captain are meta SF villains). (Meta SF https://online.liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/doi/abs/10.3828/extr.2002.43.1.04?journalCode=extr )
Christine Ruscoe as set designer finished her 3rd DW story (after Pyramids and Hand of F) with another top effort. Her CV is pretty good https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0750604/
(Crackerjack!, Z-Cars, Doomwatch, Paul Temple, Jackanory Playhouse, The Lively Arts, Grange Hill, Worzel Gummidge, The Ruth Rendell Mysteries, Midsomer Murders, Rosemary & Thyme... not to be sniffed at.)
Costumes were done by Amy Roberts who didn't start here (Image of the F) and certainly didn't end here either (Keeper of T etc) but she has a damned impressive CV (https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0730820/ ). (1990, An Englishman Abroad, Traffik, Brassed Off, Ultraviolet, Collision, Mrs Biggs, Call the Midwife, The Tunnel, Cilla, The Crown... Amy Roberts is an industry heavyweight.)
1980 ends with this story. Next ep is in the new year.
In DW history, 1980 is like 1966. 1980 gave us The Horns of Nimon and the production failure of Shada. But also the revolution (so far) of 4 serials of Season 18 (3 ok out of 4). The producer and the Script editor were replaced (Graham Williams and Douglas Adams were replaced by John Nathan Turner, Barry Letts and Chris Bidmead). There's a Doctor retiring and a new one announced. There's companion movement (one Timelady and a robot dog to an air hostie, a maths dweeb and a science princess). Then there's Tom and Lalla getting engaged and married and making the biggest mistake of their lives but that is strictly not any part of DW's narrative.
The UK TV ratings were a roller coaster in 1980... high 8's for Horns, mid 4's for Meglos and mid 5's for State of D.
1966 had a new Doctor and wildly differing qualities of DW stories (Toymaker, Gunfighters, Smugglers but also Power of the Daleks, Savages, Masterplan) Companions went from Steven Taylor (only time there was a sole male companion) through Dodo, then Ben and Polly and finally adding Jamie Macrimmon. Production office rang the changes also (John Wiles and Donald Tosh through Innes Lloyd and Gerry Davis)
UK were the same rollercoaster shape for Season 3... mid 9's for Masterplan, mid 4's for Smugglers and 7's for Power and Highlanders.
Things that weren't in common were on screen Doctor regeneration and the number of Dalek stories but there are certainly plenty of similarities. Anneke Wills was already married to Celestial Toymaker Michael Gough in 1966, so... that isn't weird at all.
ABM Rating 3.21/4.00
LJM Rating 4.19/5.00
SPJ Rating 8.30/10
No. 34 (out of 112)
Link to Cumulative Rankings
Rankings Scoreboard
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