Welcome to The First Eight – The Roarbots’ classic Doctor Who watchthrough. We’re going through the 50+ year history of the Doctor Who franchise in chronological order. This is not a “rewatch”; I’m watching these shows fresh. For the first time. I’ll do my best to leave preconceptions at the door, but I have no baggage at all that pertains to pre-Ninth Doctor reboot.

Want to watch along or catch up on classic Who on your own terms? Check out BritBox, which has nearly every existing episode available for instant streaming.

I’m not here to write an authoritative history or connect all the dots among the characters, planets, and eras of the franchise. I’m simply here to correct one of my most flagrant Geeky Blind Spots. And I hope you’ll join me on the journey. There’s only 26 seasons and 8 Doctors to catch up on. Easy peasy.

Coming off “The Keys of Marinus,” things have to be looking up, right? I mean, there’s only one direction to go. So does “The Aztecs” give the first season of Doctor Who a bump? Meh.

In some ways, it’s a definite improvement. In others, it’s kind of cringeworthy and racist. Buckle up.

“The Aztecs” (First Doctor, First Season, Story 6) is composed of the following episodes:

• “The Temple of Evil” (May 23, 1964)
• “The Warriors of Death” (May 30, 1964)
• “The Bride of Sacrifice” (June 6, 1964)
• “The Day of Darkness” (June 13, 1964)

This serial is our second real historical storyline of the first season. The first was “Marco Polo,” and – interestingly – both stories were written by the same person, John Lucarotti. Like those earlier episodes, these shows are some of the best looking of the first season. It looks like the BBC spent a majority of their budget on the costumes and sets for these two serials and let the others suffer with cardboard sets and Halloween masks.

However, and not very surprisingly, “The Aztecs” suffers many of the same faults as “Marco Polo.” Namely, it depicts an “exotic” culture by focusing on stereotypes and half-truths. According to the source of all knowledge (Wikipedia), Lucarotti actually lived in Mexico and was fascinated by the Aztec civilization. But that “fascination” seems to be mostly limited to an obsession with human sacrifices.

Both serials also suffer from a 2018 perspective in that neither features a person of color in the cast, despite being set in China and Mexico.

The story begins when the TARDIS lands inside a tomb in 15th century (or so) Mexico. Barbara and Susan investigate some of the trinkets and treasures lying about, and Barbara slips on a bracelet she finds. Enter some Aztec priests who immediately assume she’s the reincarnation of the ancient high priest Yetaxa.

Because sure. Why WOULDN’T you think that a random white woman is an Aztec goddess simply because she’s wearing a bracelet? Makes total sense.

As our crew is led out of the tomb, it seals behind them. And they spend the next four episodes trying to get back inside to the TARDIS. Which, as we’ve come to see, is kind of par for the course with the First Doctor. He and his companions don’t so much explore and save the galaxy as they stumble around and get trapped places.

Despite the attention (and budget) given to the costumes, there’s not much more that’s praiseworthy about this story.

Barbara initially sees the beauty in the Aztec culture (even though The Doctor sees them as “gruesome savages”), which is why plays along in her role as Yetaxa. However, she very quickly takes that role as confused goddess entirely too seriously and decides to stop human sacrifices and snuff out the “evil parts” of Aztec culture.

In short, she becomes a white savior.

And the villain of this story? It’s the priest who doesn’t believe Barbara is a reincarnated goddess and wants to preserve his culture. Yeah, that’s right. The dude who knows they’re lying and wants to save his way of life is the bad guy. That checks out.

The Doctor, for his part, chastises Barbara for trying to stop the human sacrifices. He rants that they can’t interfere and try to change others’ culture. This is definitely news to me. He comes awfully short to laying out a Prime Directive, but it’s all hogwash. It’s almost always The Doctor who meddles in the cultures native to wherever and whenever they are. It’s kind of his whole shtick.

“You can’t fight a whole way of life, Barbara.”

Nevertheless, despite The Doctor’s holier-than-thou patronizing, he stumbles through these episodes like a moronic child. He plots against Ian and almost guarantees his death, he traps Ian in a flooding tunnel, and he JUST HAPPENS to do the exact sequence of convoluted events required to propose to a woman. So much for being a super genius.

“Yes, I made some cocoa and got engaged.”

We’re also treated to a lot of bad acting, false starts, stutters, terrible fight choreography, and actors over one another. Much of this serial feels like bad first takes that were used accidentally. And Hartnell (The Doctor) is by far the poorest actor among the core cast of four.

Don’t get me wrong; I’m enjoying this journey through early Doctor Who, but The First Doctor is ROUGH.

Final gripe? The Aztecs’ mightiest warrior – Ixta – is pitted against Ian in a fight to the death. Their fight, though? Ixta moves like a clumsy slow-motion marionette with broken strings. And he gets easily taken down by Ian, a kindly British schoolteacher.

I wouldn’t call “The Aztecs” a total failure, though. As I said, the costumes and sets are great. And I’m really digging these attempts at historical stories, warts and all. And even though there are plenty of missteps and fumbles throughout these four episodes, there is (as was the case with “The Daleks”) one line that nearly makes it all worth it – and one that we’ll come back to and re-examine again. Call it a hunch.

“What’s the point of traveling through time and space if you can’t change anything?”