Doctor Who: Battlefield

Battlefield is the first story of the 1989 season of British science fiction series Doctor Who. This was the final season of the show's original 26 year run before its untimely cancellation.

Battlefield is something of an underrated gem, as the three stories that followed it in Season 26 were highly acclaimed by fans of the series. But, taken on its own merits, Battlefield is a good, entertaining, well-written story.

Penned by Ben Aaronovich, Battlefield concerns a centuries-old conflict from a parallel dimension spilling over onto our Earth. The combatants of this war are the source of England's mythic Arthurian legends.

The witch queen Morgaine and her son Mordred arrive on Earth in the 1990s with an army of raygun-wielding knights, searching for the sword Excalibur and its possessor, King Arthur himself, who has been missing for a millennia. The time traveling Doctor and his teenage assistant Ace, played by Sylvester McCoy and Sophie Aldred, are drawn to the conflict when they pick up a distress signal transmitted by Excalibur. Also finding themselves opposing Morgaine are the forces of UNIT, a military strikeforce with a mandate to combat extraterrestrial threats.

Battlefield is one of a rare handful of stories from Doctor Who's original run that examines the idea that time travel is not nearly so straightforward as it usually appears on the series. The Doctor is an old enemy of Morgaine, but he has never met her... at least not yet. In his own personal future, the Doctor realizes, he will travel back in time and confront Morgaine for the first time (from her point of view, that is). Indeed, the Doctor finds a number of clues left by his future self, who will leave them remembering how he found them in the past. Confused yet?

This is also the first proper appearance of UNIT on the show since 1976. Their former British commander, Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, is called out of retirement to take charge of the crisis.

Portrayed by Nicholas Courtney, the Brigadier first appeared in the late 1960s. Originally depicted as a tough, capable, steel-nerved soldier, over time Lethbridge-Stewart gradually devolved into a semi-comedic, almost ineffectual figure who was helpless to combat alien menaces without the aid of the Doctor. Battlefield sees a return to the Brigadier of old. He is written as a dedicated, competent military officer. Although somewhat arrogant, he is ready to put his life on the line to safeguard Earth.

Confronting the demonic Destroyer, who Morgaine has summoned to turn the tide of battle, the Brigadier shouts "Get off my world!" The Destroyer mockingly replies "Pitiful. Can this world do no better than you as their champion?" To which the Brigadier answers "Probably. I just do the best I can."

Almost stealing the entire show is Jean Marsh's portrayal of Morgaine. Best known for co-creating and acting in the award-winning period drama Upstairs, Downstairs, Jean Marsh also carved out something of a niche in the 1980s and 90s playing evil witch-type villains. Unlike some of Marsh's other roles in this period, Morgaine is a much more complex character with shades of gray. Unlike the majority of the one-dimensional would-be world-conquering tyrants who have crossed swords with the Doctor over the years, Morgaine has a certain degree of moral ambiguity.

Morgaine is ruthless, more than ready to kill anyone who gets in her way. At one point, she is even willing to sacrifice her son Mordred. Yet, at the same time, she has her own personal code of conduct in war. "What is victory without honor?" she lectures to Mordred. In the end, the Doctor defeats Morgaine not by killing her our outwitting her, but by appealing to her sense of honor. Marsh's portrayal of Morgaine is compelling and memorable.

Sylvester McCoy does his enigmatic, brooding Seventh Doctor well. Battlefield is a bit of a reversal for him. Often the cosmic chess master, manipulating events on a grand scale, this time the Doctor finds himself in events beyond his control. In fact, his actions are to a degree being guided by his own future self.

As the Doctor attempts to bring an end to bloodshed throughout the story, McCoy does moral outrage very well. At times, it is a bit overplayed, as McCoy grits his teeth and hisses outrage in a low voice. But on the whole, his portrayal works. In a way, this is one of his best stories. He is neither the clownish figure of his first few stories, nor the grandmaster shaping universal events, but simply a determined voice of moral authority attempting to defeat evil and restore peace.

It's interesting that in the previous season, the Doctor was quite willing to trick two sets of longtime enemies, the Daleks and the Cybermen, into destroying themselves. Yet in Battlefield, when confronted with actually killing an enemy with his own hands, the Doctor is unable to do so. It's an interesting, if inconstant, moral stance, in that he's ready to let his enemies do themselves in, but he is unwilling to pull the trigger himself, so to speak.

In a way, you could argue that the Brigadier is the more honest of the two. Yes, Lethbridge-Stewart is ready to turn to violence as the first solution. But at least his position is consistent, and he's never claimed to be anything more than a soldier doing his duty to protect humanity.

Acting-wise, one unfortunately cringe-worthy moment is when Christopher Bowen's portrayal of Mordred goes totally over the top, and he spends an entire minute laughing maniacally, almost hysterically. I don't know if that was the actor's decision, or the director's, but it's just too campy for words. On the whole, Mordred is just too melodramatic. But there is one really good moment when a look of horror and betrayal spreads over his face as he realizes that him mother finds even him expendable.

The Battlefield DVD is a two disc set. On the second disk is an expanded version of the story that restores a number of scenes cut from the broadcast show for timing reasons. These restored scenes help to further explain the subplots, as well as giving some very good character moments for Ace and the Brigadier. This version also has spruced-up CGI effects that improve on what was available nearly 20 years ago.

Among the extras is "Storm Over Avalon," a 22 minute retrospective featuring members of the cast and crew. These "making of" features are interesting to see how the creative personnel look back on work they did decades earlier.

Another extra is "From Kingdom to Queen," which has Jean Marsh reminiscing about her two roles on Doctor Who in the 1960s, and her thoughts on portraying Morgaine. There are short clips from the Sixties stories. I enjoyed watching those, as both The Crusade and The Dalek Masterplan are incomplete stories, with certain episodes having unfortunately been erased by the BBC in the 1970s. It's a pleasure to see a bit of the surviving footage. There's an especially dramatic scene between Marsh and Julian Glover from The Crusade that I was glad was included. And Marsh's recollections about her three roles are amusing and entertaining.

Battlefield will probably never be regarded as one of the all-time great Doctor Who stories. Nevertheless, it is a solid entry in the series, with quality performances from Nicholas Courtney and Jean Marsh. The extended version and the various extras make the DVD worth picking up for any Doctor Who fan.