Where did Romana go? Weren't she and the Doctor supposed to be looking for the third segment to the Key to Time? And how did Vivien Fay (Susan Engel) become a giant Cornish game hen demanding blood sacrifices, anyway?
To answer these pressing questions, David Fisher's script for Part Three of "The Stones of Blood" pivots from antiquity to hyperspace in an abrupt about-face triggering narrative entropy that begins to drag the story out after having worked in flashes of both flippancy and Gothic horror.
As Vivien makes Romana disappear at the Nine Travelers stone circle on a Cornwall moor, the Doctor and archaeologist Emilia Rumford (Beatrix Lehmann) discover portraits at the nearby manor that paint Vivien as the ancient Cailleach before they are chased from the manor by Vivien's two murderous Ogri, stone monsters that live on blood---although Emilia, truncheon in hand, seems determined to track the Ogri to their lair.
Inverting Karl Marx's famous dictum about history, the Doctor dispatches one of the Ogri in a farcical flourish, waving his overcoat like a toreador's cape to the strains of musical composer Dudley Simpson's bullfighting rondo, that incites the Ogri to tumble over the edge of a cliff, visually less than impressive even in director Darrol Blake's brief shot. Then the pair confront Vivien at the stone circle, with Vivien hinting at where she has sent Romana before making herself disappear.
Repairing to Vivien's now-vacant cottage, the Doctor and Emilia, with K9's help, construct a gun-like device designed to help the Doctor traverse into hyperspace while the trio engage in a lively, sometimes arch discussion about physics and the Doctor's origin; when Emilia asks if he is from outer space, the Doctor replies drolly that he is actually from "inner time." Returning to the stone circle, Emilia uses the gun-like device to send the Doctor after Romana in hyperspace as K9 manages to fight off the two remaining Ogri attacking them, with the stone monoliths retreating to recharge themselves.
Now comes the tragedy portion of Marx's dictum. As reviewer Sleepin_Dragon astutely notes, the Ogri's encounter with a camping couple (James Murray, Shirin Taylor) yields the most frightening moment in "The Stones of Blood," a "Hammer Horror" moment sure to have raised the hackles of media critic Mary Whitehouse and her ilk. But there was even more to incense Whitehouse. As the shirtless young man emerges from the pup tent, he is buttoning up his pants, sexually suggestive even if the young woman is reasonably clothed when she emerges moments later, with their cries of agony evincing an ambiguous flavor---and despite the "something for the dads" attractiveness of the Doctor's female companions from Anneke Wills to then-current Mary Tamm, any suggestion of sexual activity, or even innocent romantic attraction, was to be studiously avoided until the 2005 reboot. (Although there are moments during Seventh Doctor Sylvester McCoy's run that can raise eyebrows.)
Meanwhile, the Doctor has emerged inside a spaceship hovering in hyperspace just above the stone circle (and is thus is invisible to Earthbound observers) and discovers Romana. As they explore what the Doctor deduces is a prison ship, they inadvertently free the imprisoned Megara, a pair of disembodied entities (voiced by Gerald Cross and David McAlister), justice machines that tersely inform the Doctor that the penalty for freeing them without authorization is death. Thus, Part Three is already starting to deflate, with silver-coated Vivien's ominous threat delivering a limp cliffhanger that seems to linger awkwardly before the closing credits roll.
Lehmann gets the spotlight here while Engel, her narrative function revealed, seems poised for a spotlight in the upcoming concluding episode. The model work for the spaceship in hyperspace and the soundstage interiors of same are not only redolent of classic "Doctor Who" (and also include a brief cameo of a Wirrn from Season 12's "The Ark in Space") but also shatter the fresh rural and countryside atmosphere with overly familiar images. And while depictions of the Megara might not be the notorious men in rubber suits, the little bulbs of light dancing in air that pulse when they speak is cheesy sci-fi that is a decidedly unengaging anticlimax, marking the transition from Cornwall to cornball.
REVIEWER'S NOTE: What makes a review "helpful"? Every reader of course decides that for themselves. For me, a review is helpful if it explains why the reviewer liked or disliked the work or why they thought it was good or not good. Whether I agree with the reviewer's conclusion is irrelevant. "Helpful" reviews tell me how and why the reviewer came to their conclusion, not what that conclusion may be. Differences of opinion are inevitable. I don't need "confirmation bias" for my own conclusions. Do you?
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