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 for the first time.

This is not an effort 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.

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.

“The Space Museum” (First Doctor, Second Season, Story 15) is composed of the following episodes:

• “The Space Museum” (April 24, 1965)
• “The Dimensions of Time” (May 1, 1965)
• “The Search” (May 8, 1965)
• “The Final Phase” (May 15, 1965)

After the atrocity that is “The Crusade,” practically anything should be a step up. But would you believe that “The Space Museum” is actually good? I know, shocker! Not only that, but it (spoiler alert) sets a trend that lasts the remainder of the second season. That’s right, folks; the next three serials are actually quite enjoyable! Miracle of miracles.

Our fearless TARDIS crew arrives on the planet Xeros, a museum planet that seems to be in a somewhat alternate dimension. The Doctor, Ian, Barbara, and Vicki go out to explore – as they are wont to do – and start wandering the halls of the museum.

Mystery 1 is a nonfunctioning (dead?) Dalek on display. Mystery 2 is that the TARDIS crew can see (but not hear) other people throughout the museum, but those people can apparently neither see nor hear them. And finally, Mystery 3 reveals itself when our crew finds themselves on display in one of the museum’s galleries!

Ooh, a mint condition First Doctor? That’s gotta be worth a fortune.

It turns out the TARDIS, like an old DVD player, somehow skipped the disc and arrived before it arrived. Which means The Doctor and his companions are mere shadows of themselves until time “catches up” with them (somehow) and they are doomed to become museum artifacts.

But now that they know their fate, surely they can escape it, right?

“The Space Museum” is the first story to really deal with the unpredictability of time travel, and I can only imagine these episodes blowing little kids’ minds in 1965.

Though the first episode sets up this existential crisis and truly mind-expanding scenario, the majority of the serial centers on the class struggles between the dominant Moroks (who oversee the museum and are from a vast intergalactic empire) and the servile Xerons (who are native to the planet and made to maintain the museum).

It should also be noted that the Moroks have seriously kickass hair.

Putting Eddie Munster to shame

As a matter of course, a trio of Xerons (including one played by Jeremy Bulloch, who would later go to play Boba Fett in another sci-fi franchise) plan a revolt… but don’t really have a plan for their revolution. Luckily for them, Ian, Barbara, and Vicki are there to help.

There are of course plot twists and events and strain credulity. Such as when Vicki raids the armory with the Xerons and somehow knows how to hack the lie detector security system in about 20 seconds. But there are also a number of rather charming moments that made me smile… or laugh out loud.

While eluding capture at one point, The Doctor hides inside the museum’s Dalek and even does the Dalek voice! “I fooled them all. I am the master.” So help me, I actually liked the First Doctor for the first time.

There’s also a scene where the Doctor suddenly gets pulled through a wall with a sliding panel like Fred in the Scooby-Doo credits.

But don’t let that momentary acceptance of the Doctor fool you. He’s still completely intolerable. At this point, he’s essentially Chamberlain from The Dark Crystal – but far less useful. All giggling and “hmm-ing” and super annoying, but he remains largely useless. Ian continues to be the hero who solves nearly every problem.

“The Space Museum” ends with our gang having escaped their fate as museum displays (natch), the Xerons once again in control of their planet, and a very REAL fleet of Daleks chasing the TARDIS through time. Which leads us to…

Next time: “The Chase”

Ted Cruz’s first job at Epcot’s Spaceship Earth