Doctor Who: Pyramids of Mars

CinemaSerf 6/23/2024 2:05:25PM 8.4

It's hard for me to have a favourite "Dr. Who" series, but this is probably the one I can watch over and over again. It's Tom Baker who lands the "TARDIS" with his assistant "Sarah Jane" (Elisabeth Sladen) in Edwardian Britain after being, as usual, dragged off course. Immediately they smell a rat as the local stately home seems to be the source of some energy that is truly out of place. Meantime, we know that local Egyptologist "Scarman" (Bernard Archard) had entered a long lost tomb and is now quite literally a shadow of his former self - under the mind control of the evil "Sutekh" who was imprisoned many millennia ago by Horus to prevent him from turning the universe to dust. Using his army of robotic mummies and his puppet "Scarman", he is determined to free himself and it's only the wits and guile of the "Doctor" that might be able to stop him. These stories were always better when they had their roots in some genuine mythology, and what better than ancient Egyptian lore coupled with some futuristic technology and probably my favourite baddie (and costume) ever faced by the Time Lord. Sladen worked well as his plucky cohort and this series also benefits from Peter Copley's "Dr. Warlock" and the recognisable Michael Sheard as the sibling "Scarman" who's a bit of an useful amateur scientist himself. It's got tea-time menace a-plenty and certainly had me reading about the Egyptian pantheon at the time - even if I was about 8! I still recall the answer to the logic puzzle near the denouement, even now... Great fun.