Alien Plant Monsters Hate Pensions!
The Doctor and current companion Sarah Jane Smith are called in to serve as advisers on a recent discovery made by some World Ecology Bureau scientists down in Antarctica. It seems that they found a bizarre-looking seed pod in a layer of ice and think it is extraterrestrial in origin. The Doctor confirms this when he recognizes the pod as belonging to a Krynoid, a parasitic alien weed. He and Sarah Jane race to Antarctica by helicopter (not by TARDIS, weirdly) only to find they're too late: team member Winlett has been stung and infected by a vine which grew from the pod after it thawed out, and it is slowly transforming him into a half human, half plant monster.
Krynoid pods always travel in pairs, the Doctor says, and sure enough, he, Sarah Jane and Stevenson, one of the scientists, unearth a second pod from the ice where the first one was found. He resolves to keep it frozen. Meanwhile, Winlett escapes and kills the man assigned to guard him. He begins stalking the base, endangering the Doctor, Sarah Jane and Stevenson, the only ones still alive.
Their struggle for survival is going to get a lot harder, though, because a dissatisfied World Ecology Bureau pencil pusher takes information about the seed pods to rich plant collector Harrison Chase and tells him where the research base is in exchange for lots of money. Chase, deciding such a pod would be an excellent addition to his collection, tells his henchman Scorby to go to Antarctica and retrieve the pod: and to eliminate anyone who gets in his way!
One of the most taut and suspenseful Doctor Who serials, with complication mounted on complication adding to the growing dilemma. And the sequence in Antarctica is only the first two episodes of a six-part serial! Needless to say Scorby succeeds in his mission and brings the pod back to England, and after barely escaping from Antarctica, the Doctor and Sarah Jane have to deal with this too, and the ornery Chase, who absolutely embodies the "Screw the rules I have money!" mentality, is hellbent on the Doctor not taking away the newest addition to his plant collection. Of course, the Krynoid pod stings someone else, turning them into a mutant plant monster threatening mankind, and things just keep escalating and escalating.
This is a fabulous DVD with a wealth of extras including my personal favorite, the audio commentaries! There's one for each of the six episodes of the serial, with everyone from Tom Baker to the actors who played the redshirts who wind up as plant monster fodder eagerly participating. If 1979's City of Death got me hooked on Baker's Doctor, then it is this serial with solidified my love of classic Who.Read full review
