Hello everyone! 🙂
Welcome to ‘Bradley’s Basement’ blog and I’m Tim Bradley!
Season 18 of the classic ‘Doctor Who’ TV series is a significant season. It was the first one of the 1980s, the first one under producer John Nathan-Turner’s reign, and it was seventh and final season of Tom Baker’s era as the Fourth Doctor. This is also a season with its own behind-the-scenes issues.
Tom Baker had clashes with JNT, and there were tonal changes that made him unhappy, including the change of the show’s theme music and the ‘question mark’ costume design. The overdose of humour that was in Season 17 got toned down by script-editor Christopher H. Bidmead, making the stories sombre.
More hard science elements were featured in the stories, making there less variety in terms of times and places in ‘Doctor Who’. Season 18 was also Lalla Ward’s final season as Romana as well as for K-9. Lalla Ward married Tom Baker after Season 18 before the couple soon separated one year later. 😀
Season 18 introduced three new companions after Romana and K-9. In ‘Full Circle’, there’s Matthew Waterhouse as Adric, a boy from the planet Alzarius in the pocket universe of E-Space. In ‘The Keeper of Traken’, there’s Sarah Sutton as Nyssa of Traken, my favourite ‘Doctor Who’ companion. 🙂
And in ‘Logopolis’, there’s Janet Fielding as Tegan, an Australian air hostess who stumbles aboard the TARDIS by accident. We’re also introduced to Anthony Ainley as the evil Master. The tonal changes in Season 18 and the introduction of three new companions in Tom Baker’s final season would help shape what the Peter Davison era would be like.
Season 18 is a mixed bag of a season for me. The highlights are the introduction of Adric, Nyssa and Tegan, and ‘State of Decay’ and ‘The Keeper of Traken’ are the best stories out of the season. The season does conclude Tom Baker’s era on a very decent note, especially when he saves the Universe.
Thanks for reading!
Bye for now!
Tim 🙂
Bradley's Basement 
Thank you, Tim.
I liked the hard science of Season 18. As for how that can affect variety for times and places in Dr. Who, even with the best tonal changes, it may have been particularly true for the UNIT phase in the first half of Pertwee’s era.
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Hi scifimike,
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on Season 18 of ‘Doctor Who’. Interesting how you compared Season 18 to the first half of Jon Pertwee’s era. I suppose if Chris Bidmead did more than one season, we would have had a continous trend of hard science sci-fi stories, especially during the Peter Davison era.
Whilst I have mixed feelings about Season 18, I can’t deny it’s a fascinating and enjoyable season to check out, even though I would have ended Tom Baker’s era differently. Thankfully, he had one gothic horror story in ‘State of Decay’, echoing the gothic horror aspects of Tom Baker’s first three seasons as the Fourth Doctor. And ‘The Keeper of Traken’ is definitely my favourite story out of the entire season.
Many thanks for your comments.
Tim 🙂
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