The First Eight: Classic Doctor Who: "The Sensorites"

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.

This serial, in my mind, establishes Doctor Who as a work of science fiction. Until now, we’ve been traveling through time and space with The Doctor and his companions, but nothing about the episodes has felt incredibly science fiction-y.

Sure, we met the Daleks, and the TARDIS is a spaceship of sorts, but we haven’t had a story that was clearly set in the future, took place in space, or involved radically different alien species (with the exception of the Brains of Morphoton in “The Keys of Marinus”).

“The Sensorites” changes all that. The story begins when our gang of time-traveling misfits end up on a ship manned by astronauts from the 28th century (who also happen to be British; what are the odds?).

“Whatchoo talkin’ bout, Willis?”

“The Sensorites” (First Doctor, First Season, Story 7) is composed of the following episodes:

“Strangers in Space” (June 20, 1964)
“The Unwilling Warriors” (June 27, 1964)
“Hidden Danger” (July 11, 1964)
“A Race Against Death” (July 18, 1964)
“Kidnap” (July 25, 1964)
“A Desperate Venture” (August 1, 1964)

Almost immediately, The Doctor (and Ian, Barbara, and Susan, obviously), are locked out of the TARDIS “permanently.” Why? The Sensorites have stolen the lock. Amazing. Who knew the TARDIS was so susceptible to 2nd grade shenanigans? It’s honestly unbelievable how The Doctor is able to still be in possession of the TARDIS when he constantly gets locked out of it.

In any case, those 28th century British astronauts? They’re dead. Or are they? Well, we’re meant to think they’re dead, but they regain consciousness fairly quickly. Turns out they’re orbiting Sense Sphere, which is the home planet of the Sensorites, who have essentially taken them prisoner and won’t let them leave orbit.

A sequence of Creepy Ian creepin’ on Future Lady Astronaut

Creepin’ intensifies

Max Creep Factor 12!

The Sensorites have mind-control powers, which is why the crew appears dead. They’ve also messed up fellow crewmember John pretty horrifically, which is why his crewmates locked him in another room (into which Barbara and Susan OF COURSE unwittingly enter).

“Are you OK, Mr Astronaut? How can we help?”

“…There. Is that better?”

The first episode ends on an awesome cliffhanger (no sarcasm intended here, for once) in which Ian sees a Sensorite peering in through a window from the vacuum of space! Interestingly, The Twilight Zone‘s “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet” used this same gag a year before “The Sensorites,” but it’s still just as effective.

The character design for the Sensorites is pretty awesome. However, the alien peering through the window is TOTALLY DIFFERENT at the beginning of the second episode. How could such a continuity flub make it passed the ever-watchful and oh-so-strict BBC producers (sarcasm intended here)?

End of episode 1…

…Beginning of episode 2 – How did THAT happen?

The Sensorites basically have upside-down human heads; their “beards” look like human hair. It’s just as creepy as you’d imagine. They also have no mouths and are clearly just guys wearing masks (you can see their mouths moving beneath the masks). Which is kind of awesome in a charming, we’re-making-this-in-our-garage-with-no-budget kind of way.

ANYWAY, the Sensorites board, Susan and Barbara defy them by using the POWER OF THEIR MINDS (I dunno), and the astronaut crew is back in tip-top shape. Susan, as it turns out, is telepathic and mind melds with the Sensorites. (Yeah, I have no idea when that happened, either.) She ends up going down to their home planet with them.

“The blue chicken has flown the coop. I repeat: The blue chicken has flown the coop.”

“10-4 Big Daddy. You’re comin’ through loud and clear.”

“Hello? Is this thing on. Hello??”

On board the ship, Ian and The Doctor outwit the Sensorites by turning off the light. They immediately do their Velma Dinkley impression, crawling around on the floor, totally blind. It’s about this point that they lose all sense of being a threat. Darkness and noise defeat them. Aside from their mind-control powers, they’re pretty helpless.

As the story moves down to the Sense Sphere, it shifts gears and focuses on political machinations among various Sensorites. Because that’s clearly what the public wants.

Oh, and Ian catches a mysterious disease, and The Doctor treats him with salt water. I wish I were joking.

“I learned not to meddle in the affairs of others years ago.” (uttered by The Doctor in all seriousness, without a hint of irony)

Ultimately, The Sensorites defeat themselves because of one of the oldest racist stereotypes: They all look the same. The Doctor comments that he doesn’t know what they’d do if the Sensorites changed their badges or sashes, since he can’t tell them apart.

Wow, rude! Except apparently it’s true! Even the Sensorites can’t tell themselves apart. The city administrator (who’s gunning for power) steals the sash of an elder, and that’s all it takes to pass himself off as that elder. NO ONE NOTICES HE’S NOT THE SAME GUY!

Huh.

“Wait. Who are you again?”

“Told you.”

In the end, our travelers reclaim the TARDIS’s lock and get back inside. The British astronauts are allowed to go on their merry way. And the Sensorites are left with crippling self-doubt and loathing.

But The Doctor has apparently had enough of Ian’s shit (even though Ian has REPEATEDLY saved the day and is – as I’ve said before – the true hero of Doctor Who‘s first season). When Ian makes an offhand remark that “at least [the astronauts] know where they’re going,” The Doctor loses it. Totally flips out and promises to kick Ian and Barbara out at their next stop.

Sounds to me like he was just looking for an excuse. I guess we’ll see if he makes good on his threat in “The Reign of Terror.”

However, despite this story’s ups and downs, I wouldn’t trade it for anything. In what’s becoming tradition (see “The Daleks” and “The Aztecs”), the entire story was saved by one line: