A Bluffer’s Guide to Doctor Who: Galaxy 4
But wait! I haven’t seen Galaxy 1, 2 or 3 yet!
Describe Galaxy 4 in six words:
Don’t judge by external appearances, kids!
This is… the one with psychotic, beautiful women and friendly, ugly fish.
Episodes: 82–85 out of 863 (as of 31st October, 2021)
First broadcast: 11 September — 2 October, 1965
What happens?
Not a lot. There’s two groups on this planet. One group are gorgeous, beautiful women but they’re mean. Boo!
They’re trying to repair their spaceship because the planet is going to disintegrate in two days. Oh no!
The other group are called the Rills and are ugly, disgusting creatures… so obviously, they’re actually the nice aliens.
The Doctor and Vicki help the Rills. Steven is held hostage by the women. Steven escapes. The Rills fly off. The TARDIS leaves. And the women are left abandoned on a planet that blows up on them.
Oh, and there’s some cute robots.
Any behind-the-scenes gossip?
Yes! If recording The Time Meddler was William Hartnell and John Wiles getting off on the wrong foot then this opening manoeuvres of the war.
Verity Lambert, the outgoing producer, and Dennis Spooner, the outgoing story editor, had commissioned this script from William Emms. At the time of commission, the story was going to feature Ian and Barbara. By the time, Donald Tosh was in the story editor’s chair, Ian and Barbara were being written out meaning their parts of the story would need to go to Steven.
Peter Purves protested about his character suddenly behaving erratically. Maureen O’Brien and William Hartnell also criticised the scripts. Wiles responded by threatening to fire Hartnell and began making plans to replace O’Brien when her contract expired.
Mervyn Pinfield was assigned to direct, having previously directed The Sensorites and The Space Museum. However, he fell ill meaning Derek Martinus took over. Martinus had only recently completed the BBC’s director course but would return to Doctor Who several times in his BBC career.
Observations / Things to Say:
Vicki: Names the Chumblies (a lovely character trait continued) Everyone soon adopts the name. Vicki explaining how throwing a rock is scientific, making up lies to deceive the Drahvin: Quick, witty. She really is the model for the companion going forward.
Maureen O’Brien plays Vicki with some power, some cheek. Makes the Doctor seem less irritable because his patronising is regularly mocked.
Hartnell treating the march of the Chumblies like he is leading the cavalry: Clearly having fun.
Random continuity references: Astral Map (The Web Planet), the Doctor and Vicki recall events on Xeros (The Space Museum).
Chumbleys are more than just killing machines: They’re servants to the very interesting Rills. Thus, cannot be rivals to the Daleks.
Doctor wants to meet the Rills, directly after being told by the Drahvins that they’ve killed one of them. Bit odd to be so happy about it?
No symptoms of the planet disintegrating? No regular earthquakes, ground cracking up, planet getting hotter. Nothing to signal that the planet is about to explode, no countdown for Ep 4.
The whole beauty/evil and ugly/kind twist is too basic to sustain a four-parter (note how The Sensorites’ twist was just one element among the City Administrator’s machinations. Also, the idea that “there’s a bunch of humans that think the war’s still on” leads to scenes, drama in a way “ugly people can be nice” doesn’t.
Eps 1 and 2 are potentially tense thrillers/mysteries (we’ll need the episodes themselves to tell) but while 3 is nice to have, it and 4 are average. There’s no depth given to the idea so it makes no impact, especially as next episode is all about ugly evil monsters versus heroic humans. It also makes things kinda worse: The male Rills are capable of invention, generosity, negotiation. Female Drahvins are paranoid, controlling bitches that want to kill/subjugate men.
Between You and Me
This must have been Chibnall’s favourite story as it has a lot of traits I associate with him.
Long walks through desert planets. Check.
Not enough for companions to do. Check.
Simple moral undermining itself because there’s no real depth to the idea. Check.
This is Doctor Who talking down to its audience. Every other story has been better than this. No wonder Hartnell et al. didn’t like the scripts.
Recommend / Further Reading: