Doctor Who: The Cave of Skulls

Spoilers for the episode

Story:

The Doctor gets captured by cavemen and then so does everyone else but it turns out his biggest problem is he’s lost his matches.

Thoughts:

The cavemen are trying to decide who should be the new leader and it looks like the one who can make fire has an edge on the other candidates. In this case there’s just two Za and Kal.

Za’s father was the leader and he could make fire but he never showed his son. Kal is a stranger to the tribe but he’s actually being useful and getting them food instead of sitting around and trying to make fire.

Apparently cavemen think making fire involves screaming at ashes and asking twigs where the fire has gone. Maybe that’s what he saw his father do but I understand why they’d prefer a stranger to lead them.

Back in the TARDIS we get a bit of a pointless conversation about if the Doctor can travel in time or not when they could just open the door and show them. It only serves to set up that Ian and the Doctor don’t like each other very much and are going to have lots arguments from this point forward.

Even though I don’t think anyone would act like Barbara in the face of time travel her reaction is less annoying than Ian’s assertions that it’s impossible. If he’s so sure he’s right all he has to do is be a bit patient and he’ll be proved right. And what do you know seconds later the door opens and there’s the proof.

The Doctor goes out to collect soil samples so he can say what year they’re in because his year-o-meter isn’t calculating properly. It’s currently at 0 and I just love that it’s called a year-o-meter.

So then the Doctor gets kidnapped and wakes up to cavemen arguing over his ability to make fire. He tells them he’ll do what they want as long as he’s aloud to go back to his ship but it turns out he’s lost his matches and he has a little panic. I like that it’s such a simple premise of the cavemen want fire and the doctor’s problem is he’s lost his matches.

Then as his companions try to save him they get captured as well. Susan rushes in like she’s some sort of warrior screaming all the way and jumping on the back of a caveman. She’s willing to fight to get her grandfather back and it doesn’t end well but she puts lots of effort in.

I like Susan. The hysterical fit when she realises her grandfather is missing is a bit much but I get she’s excitable and in the 1960’s women aren’t seen as very capable. Especially teenage girls (they aren’t given much credit now either).

Although it makes me wonder what happened when it was just the two of them and something happened. How did she cope then? Or was it all smooth sailing up to this point.

I also like that the Doctor gets kidnapped. The first kidnapping of the show (well it’s the second if you count Ian and Barbara) and it’s the Doctor who it happens to. Not one of the humans or one of the female leads who in auditions had to show that they could scream. But a man who knows more than any of them and has the most experience with travelling in time.

Really this is the best choice because they can’t leave without him. Where as he could leave without them and he’d probably try to.

I love how bad tempered and awful the doctor is to his companions. It’s such a change from the doctor I know and it’s brilliant.

Someone thought it through that if your spaceship traveled through time you’d want it to blend in so it should be able to change shape. This is the trip where the TARDIS’s chameleon circuit breaks and what a good idea that was. Can you imagine this show without the TARDIS looking like it does? I know we wouldn’t know any different but it’s such a big thing now.

This decision was more to do with money than anything else but deciding on a police box out of any other object. Without it we wouldn’t have eleven being a mad man in a box.

I just love that the writers didn’t know anything about the doctor or have an explanation for the TARDIS being bigger on the inside, just one line to try and make it make sense, but they knew they wanted the TARDIS to always look like a police box.

It does takes Susan quite a while to realise the TARDIS hasn’t changed forms to disguise itself and only after one of her teachers points out that it looks out of place.

The arguing between Za and Kal is funny. It’s like modern politics in that the truth doesn’t matter only making your opponent look bad matters and that people will forget what happened if you spin it in the right way. Za and Kal focus on the fear of the people and twisting the situation to suit themselves. But it’s done with caveman logic and fears.

Za makes promises to his tribe that he’ll go out and kill lots of bears tomorrow but even cavemen have learned that politicians lie and he gets called out on his laziness. He wins later though when he gives a speech about how he’s the best provider but Kal will leave you cold, hungry and alone against the predators. The tribe has already forgotten who’s been doing what.

So Za gets everyone thrown in a cave where lots of other people have been murdered before with human skeletons everywhere and the promise that it’s their turn when the sun rises.

The skulls are gross. I don’t like skulls or brains and seeing a close up image of a caved in skull created the right atmosphere. This is what could happen to them if they’re not really careful around these people.

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