2 episodes: The Library of Alexandria, The Pathway to the Stars. Approx. 61 minutes. Written by: Simon Guerrier. Directed by: Lisa Bowerman. Produced by: David Richardson. Performed by: William Russell, Susan Franklyn.
THE PLOT
The TARDIS brings the Doctor and his companions to 5th Century Alexandria, home of the great Library of Alexandria, a center of knowledge and study in the ancient world. Barbara is thrilled, and begs the Doctor to let them stay for a while. It's a request he's happy to grant, and they enjoy a few weeks of rest during the height of ancient scholarship.
Ian strikes up a friendship - and flirtation - with Hypatia (Susan Franklyn), a female philosopher who teaches and lectures at the Library. While looking at newly-arrived books found in the hold of a Roman ship, Hypatia shows him the strangest of them: A book not in scroll form, but in the (to Ian) more familiar form of pages attached to a binding. The writing is alien, and the astronomical diagrams clearly beyond Earth's current knowledge.
The Doctor recognizes the book the work of the Mim, an advanced alien race, and declares they must take the book away before it does any damage to the timeline. But it's already too late. Just as the time travelers prepare to leave, enormous sea monsters rise from the port, laying waste to the city. Their target is the Library - and the Doctor knows there's nothing he can do, because the destruction is already fixed in history...
CHARACTERS
The Doctor: Insists that they cannot interfere with what is destined to happen to the Library. But when Susan points out that they don't actually know what happens, he's willing to exploit that loophole to limit the damage. The greatest single image of the story takes place in the second episode, with the elderly First Doctor facing down the enormous Mim armed with little more than courage, intelligence, and a tremendous amount of innate authority.
Ian: Though his friendship with Hypatia is flirtatious, he enjoys her company at least as much for the chance to debate with a fellow scientist (something he really can't do with the Doctor) as for her attractiveness. He insists to both Hypatia and himself that he and Barbara are only friends - though Hypatia is quick to point out that the evidence doesn't really support his statement. In the fashion typical of the character, he marshals several of the Library's scholars to defend the building using the surrounding artifacts and the one weakness Susan is able to reveal about the Mim.
Barbara: When she realizes they are in the Library of Alexandria, she is in awe at actually standing within such a significant institution. She revels in the chance to soak in the long-lost documents on the Library's shelves. When the Mim attack and the Library begins to burn, she risks her life to save as many of the scrolls as possible... Which results in a funny final gag that would not have been at all out-of-place in one of the television stories featuring this team of regulars.
Susan: Also very much in keeping with stories of the era, Susan gets the least to do of the regulars - Though unlike most writers of the era, Simon Guerrier remembers that she possesses knowledge far beyond that of Ian and Barbara. Since the First Doctor is tight-lipped about his knowledge of alien races, Susan is used to let their companions (and the listeners) know the necessary exposition about the Mim, and her observation that they are entirely nerve tissue leads to Ian's heroic stand at the end.
THOUGHTS
The two halves of The Library of Alexandria really shouldn't fit together. The first half is a character-based historical, with us observing the regulars' interactions with this time period and particularly Ian's interactions with Hypatia. The best scenes in this episode are the conversations between the two voiced characters, with Guerrier's well-crafted dialogue making talks focused on ancient theories about the relationship between planets and the sun into genuinely absorbing drama.
It's quite jarring when the Mim appear just before the cliffhanger, and what had been a pure historical suddenly becomes a Godzilla-like tale of monsters on a rampage. But somehow, it continues to work. The script doesn't lose its intelligence when the monsters show up. The Doctor uses scientific knowledge and a couple of items readily available to draw the Mim's attention and keep them at bay, and Ian does the same in his stand against them at the end. This, and the smartly-written debate between the Doctor and the Mim about interference in timelines, means that even with the sharp change of tone it still feels like the same piece, even with monsters laying waste to the city.
There's a lovely tag that witnesses the First Doctor interacting with children, giving a science lesson of his own that you just know is a scene in which William Hartnell would have excelled. William Russell does his usual terrific job as the primary narrator, and guest actress Susan Franklyn is also excellent as Hypatia. I give the story points for alluding to the subsequent Library, by having the scholars save a lot of the material. They may make the first Library's fall into a monster movie, but the definitely manmade destruction of the material that survives still lies ahead.
I still prefer the pure historical first episode, which creates an authentic-seeming Alexandria, and I love the way Guerrier opens on action in a way that fits the story and setting without creating confusion. But even in the second half, this remains a terrific story, one that I enjoyed enormously.
Overall Rating: 8/10.
Previous Television Story: The Reign of Terror
Next Television Story: Planet of Giants
Preceded by: The Flames of Cadiz
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