Are you a friendly Cyberman or a mean Cyberman?
An attempt to repair the TARDIS’ Chameleon Circuit lead the Doctor (Colin Baker) and Peri (Nicola Bryant) to Earth as Halley’s Comet draws near. On Earth, the Doctor and Peri discover the Dalek mercenary Lytton attempting a bold robbery…but also the threat of the Cybermen! Finding the Cybermen intend to use time travel to alter time to their benefit, the Doctor must stop the Cybermen before it is too late!
Doctor Who: Attack of the Cybermen was the first storyline of the twenty-second season of the long-running BBC series. The serial aired in two episodes on January 5, 1985 and January 12 1985. Following Doctor Who: The Twin Dilemma, Doctor Who: Attack of the Cybermen was collected as part of The Colin Baker Years as Story #138 (or Story #137 depending on how you count the unaired Tom Baker story Doctor Who: Shada).
Hands off egghead!
The Doctor continues to deal with regeneration problems in this serial and is still the “jerky” Doctor. The plan was to have the Doctor slowly become likable, but it isn’t working here. I thought Peter Davison was a good Doctor with bad stories and companions, I find Colin Baker a bad Doctor with moderately bad stories and one of the worst companions…this makes choking down the beginning of his run especially difficult until the Trial of the Time Lord where the stories pick-up a bit.
Usually Cybermen stories are pretty good and this does have some fun ties to previous Doctor Who stories. The later seasons of Doctor Who began dipping into the old reserve (probably due to sagging ratings) and it seems like what was old was new again including locations. In this entry, the Doctor returns the TARDIS to the same junkyard he originally left from in Doctor Who: An Unearthly Child when Doctor Who first premiered.
Scream if you hate Peri!
I still don’t like Peri but it is pretty bad when Peri is the more likable lead in the series at this point. I can’t get past her fake American accent which slips and slides throughout the course of the story. I wish that the producers had made more of an effort to work with her on the accent if she was going to be American or to just suggest that she spent more time in England than America…I guess it is payback for all the bad English accents by Americans.
Doctor Who: Attack of the Cybermen is a quick little adventure which fortunately runs fast. I wish that the old series could have found a better happy medium since often the episodes were too long, but on occasions like this the story never fully fleshes out due to the short length. Doctor Who: Attack of the Cybermen was followed by Doctor Who: Vengeance on Varos.
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Preceded By:
Doctor Who: The Twin Dilemma (Story #136)
Followed By:
