The Android Invasion

“What are the odds of finding a pocket full of coins all dated the same?”

The Android Invasion has a real soft spot in my heart for a number of reasons but the main one is the slightly unsettling and yet slightly exciting feel you get with it. The Doctor and Sarah land on what appears to be Earth, or at least somewhere that’s starting exporting acorns. Something very odd is going on, in the undergrowth are men dressed in what looks to be radiation suits, UNIT officers throwing themselves off cliffs and calendars all reading the same date.

The story uses a simple premise excellently, making use of the abandoned village motif, the scare tactics are utilised through small anomalies such as dead telephones, clockwork men and eternal calendars, causing the Doctor to utter “the village with no future”. One good scene to help illustrate this is following the return of the zombie like residents of the village, a pub full of them sit there silently until the clock finishes chiming eight, then all revive as if nothing was ever amiss. As is the job of the companion Sarah is soon discovered, and despite her best attempts to make small talk with a tavern full of less than impressed patrons, she decides it best to make herself scarce.

Prior to the catatonic locals making themselves known, the pub scene is home to some rather unsettling speculation. The pub, much like the village of Devesham is abandoned, and the same freshly minted coins are found by the Doctor in the cash register as were found on the dead UNIT soldier. Upon prompting by Sarah the Doctor makes an unsettling hypothesis that some sort of radioactive contaminant could be behind the evacuation of the village.

The village itself is quite familiar to Sarah, as she had to do an article on it a number of years back and still remembers her reasons for coming along: the village is home to a space centre with some dodgy goings on. With this information the Doctor decides to head on. Sarah in the meantime makes a number of other unsettling discoveries. Firstly the white suited men aren’t human. Nor are they alien. They’re machine. Fleeing in fear Sarah comes back upon the TARDIS, whereby she discovers a pod nearby. Whilst indulging her curiosity, the TARDIS takes off, and the occupant of the pod attacks Sarah.

The design of the episode is surprisingly unsettling for the time. The design of the androids is chilling, mainly down to those boggling eyes that are revealed from Sarah’s duplicate. This brings me onto the subject of her copy, and it’s apparent lack of purpose. The duplicate as we are to be made aware is there for the purpose of creating the classic doppelganger situation, however the early reveal of her as an android ruins much of the potential for the character. Whilst the initial shock when she trips up by claiming ginger beer was “delicious” when earlier the real Sarah stated she hated the stuff makes for a quick heart flutter, but doesn’t really help the story along much.

The biggest design casualty this story has to offer is the Kraals, which just look like melted Sontarans that have shaved and then been mauled by a lion, as it is they lack both originality and impact, and would have been better being kept obscure, possibly with a cloth thrown over their heads or something, just not what they were, which was a face that’s been vomited on and then run over by a lorry.

Of course, if I think this story is so good, why then do I have so little to say for it? Well the reason is that this story is a jacket potato – simple yet satisfying. If I were to go on further I’d probably just ruin what really is a good story so long as it’s kept fresh, so go, watch and enjoy, it’s classic classic Who.