Doctor Who - The Curse of Fenric
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List Price: $4.98
Features
• Color
• Original recording reissued
• NTSC
In Theaters : 29 September, 1975
Video Release : 19 July, 2000 |
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Doctor Who - The Curse of Fenric Customer Reviews
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♥♥♥♥♥ |
Some bad choices were made here!!!
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| Many here (and elsewhere) allege that this story makes absolutely no sense whatsoever at all, and yet, in Outpost Gallifrey's extensive 2003 fan poll The Curse of Fenric came in as one of the very most popular Doctor Who stories ever! Having just watched it, I do kind of understand this discrepancy. The story was likely voted so highly because it is very fast-moving and is at times quite exciting. However, to those who say that its STORY makes no sense, I have to disagree. The story actually makes perfect sense, and can be briefly summarized as follows: The land and air on earth eventually in the future becomes poisonous to us, and we homo sapiens then evolve into hemavores, which are sea-dwelling humanoid creatures that feed on blood, though what blood we feed on when humans and presumably all land life becomes extinct is not made very clear. Fish blood, presumably. Fenric, a devious being, sends the earth's remaining hemavores, including the most powerful of the hemavores, back in a time storm to 9th century Transylvania, which presumably is the etiology of our present vampire lore. Fenric returns in the 1940's after having been trapped between dimensions by the good Doctor for many centuries. Fenric wants the hemavore leader to help him cause the poisoning of the earth which eventually leads to the evolution of the hemavores, as well as kill all of his fellow hemavores. If Fenric then killed the hemavore leader, then all life on earth would presumably be destroyed. The leader of the hemavores presumably must obey Fenric because Fenric seems to be the cause of the hemavores' evolution (which suggests that this entire plot is a time loop which is then abated). Fenric also wants to best the Doctor in the same chess riddle that landed him trapped between dimensions in the first place, thereby bandaging his injured ego. The Doctor, however, convinces the hemavore leader that Fenric is tricking him into destroying all of his own people. The hemavore leader therefore decides to kill Fenric instead, but cannot act at the end because Ace's faith in the Doctor creates a psychic barrier preventing from acting. The Doctor then must berate Ace in order to break her faith in him so that the hemavore can have his way with Fenric. Now, though the story ultimately makes sense it does however flow at a very random pace, jumping from one scene to another in a very disjointed and disconnected fashion. Also, some rather bad choices were made here in attempt to tie traditional vampire lore into the story. Faith is presented as means of creating psychic barriers that shut down the functioning of the hemavores. Interestingly, however, faith seems to be more akin to a form of concentration than the mere taking of something as certainly true when there is not even enough evidence to make it seem probable or even plausible. The Russian soldier exhibits faith in communism, and Ace exhibits faith in the Doctor. What the Doctor exhibits faith in in the bizarre scene in which he seems to chant an incantation that drives the hemavores away one cannot tell. We are, however, left with a rather bad taste in our mouths, as the Doctor has ALWAYS represented a personification of the ideals of the Enlightenment, that nothing is inexplicable only unexplained, that science, when properly applied, will yield a natural explanation to any and all occurrences, and that through logic and reason one can overcome almost all obstacles. Star Trek gave us Spock as such a personification of reason, and then made it clear that Spock's problem was that he was not "human" enough; he needed to back away from being a being of pure logic and reason. Not so with the Doctor, however, who is obviously superior to we humans BECAUSE of his embracing of science and reason, not in spite of it, especially as played by Tom Baker. But here, unfortunately, were are shown an odd portrayal of this famous representation of science and reason and education running around muttering about faith and psychic barriers and incantations, the very things that Tom Baker's Doctor often scolded Leela for foolishly believing in. Yes, The Curse of Fenric makes sense, but it is not very good. |
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