Knots Landing season 13

By the late '80s, my passion for Knots Landing had become more like an obsession. I wasn't just watching it live and taping it to VCR in case I wanted to have another look (which I invariably did); I was watching it live and taping it to two VCR's, in case one broke down. I couldn't imagine a fate worse than missing an episode of Knots.

Then Season 13 rolled around, and within a few weeks, I stopped taping it to two VCR's. Was it even necessary to tape it to one? I remember being rather shocked at how quickly my devotion faded into disinterest. It's not like Knots hadn't gone through rough spells; I mean, even then, as I looked back at the history of the show, I was able to spot a half-dozen dry patches -- some of them bone dry. But there had never been anything like the first fifteen episodes of Season 13: a perfect storm of mediocrity. New writers, none with soap experience, let alone an understanding of these particular characters -- and an outgoing team who had left them with nothing to work from, merely a set of unpromising cliffhangers and compromised characters.

Classic Doctor Who countdown: the index

In sixteen entries this past summer, I ranked and reviewed all 158 serials from the classic era of Doctor Who, from my least-liked to my most-loved. In case you want to know where a particular serial falls in my countdown, and jump to that review, I offer the following alphabetical index. As I note at the top of the countdown, I came to Classic Who "cold." I knew nothing of which Doctors and companions were revered and which reviled: which periods were most beloved and which most belittled. But I quickly formed strong feelings about the various Doctors and the actors who played them, as well as about companions and writers and directors -- and was ultimately surprised to see how much my feelings differed from "fan consensus." But I've never been swayed by popular opinion. If you're looking for another paean to Hinchcliffe and Holmes, you won't find it here. I can only offer you thoughts (and perhaps a few insights) informed by my outlook, my background, my preferences and my passions. The links on the numbers will take you right to the reviews.

Abominable Snowmen, The: #10
Ambassadors of Death, The: #9
Android Invasion, The: #58
Androids of Tara, The: #8

Knots Landing season 6

Knots Landing Season 6 asks: can you build a successful primetime-soap season atop just one great storyline? -- and surprisingly, the answer is "yes."

Season 6 is the one where Val's newborn twins are stolen, an event that impacts most of the core characters, but none, heaven knows, more than Valene Clements Ewing herself. And although there's a lot more than just "Val's babies" to the season -- it juggles at least as many characters and plotlines as Season 5, and probably a few more -- nothing else really and truly pays off. Some of the story-lines, in fact, go off the rails so badly, they're jettisoned early in Season 7.

But through it all, there's Joan Van Ark, in an acting showcase unmatched in the series' fourteen seasons. Oh, other actors have seasons that play to their strengths, as well as to their characters' (Michele Lee and Ted Shackelford in Season 3, Kevin Dobson and Donna Mills in Season 5, Teri Austin in Season 10, Kathleen Noone in Season 14), but there's nothing quite like the tour-de-force that Van Ark offers up in Season 6, as Valene -- struggling to accept an explanation she knows in her heart is false -- develops a dissociative disorder, becomes convinced that she's Verna Ellers (the lead character in her latest novel) and takes off for Tennessee.

Classic Doctor Who countdown (#10 - #1)

Completing my Classic Who countdown. (For the previous ten, click here; to start from the top, all the way back at #158, with the serials I find most resistible, click here. Or if you're looking for a particular serial, you can jump right to the index.) The serials below are my ten favorites. They include the best performances by the two greatest actors to play the Doctor in the classic series. Coincidence? Certainly not. Four of the ten are written by original script editor David Whitaker, who taught everyone else how to write Doctor Who, then showed them that he could do it better. Classic Who's best writer? Certainly. The serials below have moved me and inspired me; they're miraculous creations, and I have returned to each a dozen times or more. I suspect if Classic Who had turned out only these ten serials, I'd be no less a fan.

10. The Abominable Snowmen (Second Doctor, 1967)
written by Mervyn Haisman & Henry Lincoln
directed by Gerald Blake

Classic Doctor Who countdown (#20 - #11)

Continuing my countdown of Classic Who serials, from my least-liked to my most-loved. (For the previous ten, click here; to start from the top, click here. Or if you're looking for a particular serial, you can jump right to the index.) Remarkably, as we enter my top 20, and once we pass the first one (the ultimate "love it or hate it" serial, and the last of the seven unfairly maligned serials I wrote about in 2013), these next ten are probably the serials where my opinions most match popular consensus. They're some of the most beloved classic serials, and I love them too -- although, as I've discovered, not always for the reasons others do.

20. Terminus (Fifth Doctor, 1983)
written by Stephen Gallagher
directed by Mary Ridge

Classic Doctor Who countdown (#30 - #21)

Continuing my countdown of Classic Who serials, from my least-liked to my most-loved. (For the previous ten, click here; to start from the top, click here. Or if you're looking for a particular serial, you can jump right to the index.) As we enter my top 30, maybe this is a good time to discuss "lost serials," as some of my favorite stories remain missing. Recently, I heard a Whovian dismiss the lost serials by insisting, "There's no way of knowing what they're really like." Of course there is. If the surviving audio is engrossing, if the telesnaps and production photographs reveal a credible design, if the director's talents are well-established or the dialogue feels well-played and well-paced (suggesting he had a good grip on the material), then the reconstructions tell you most of what you need to know. Since I started watching Doctor Who, quite a few missing episodes have been unearthed, and not once has a discovery made me radically rethink my impression of a serial. My favorite Cybermen story, my two favorite Dalek stories, and my four favorite historicals are partially or fully missing. Let's pray they're someday recovered, but in the meantime, the lack of video footage doesn't impair my enjoyment.

30. The Pirate Planet (Fourth Doctor, 1978)
written by Douglas Adams
directed by Pennant Roberts

Classic Doctor Who countdown (#40 - #31)

Continuing my countdown of Classic Who serials, from my least-liked to my most-loved. (For the previous ten, click here; to start from the top, click here. Or if you're looking for a particular serial, you can jump right to the index.) This next ten include the first serials filmed by Patrick Troughton and Peter Davison, the two finest actors to play Classic Doctors. When I first started watching Classic Who, their genius seemed obvious at once to me -- and to my husband as well: an actor himself, with a performer's insights and seriously high standards. I remember going online soon after and seeing a lot of Troughton love -- and seeing a fair bit of Davison anger: mostly by people who, I realized, were still upset, some thirty years later, that he'd replaced "their Doctor," Tom Baker. As if still clinging to a child's view that Davison had somehow "forced" Baker out. I still see this attitude occasionally from adults. Let's not beat around the bush: there's a lot you can be subjective about where Classic Who is concerned; as I've said here, I'm delighted, like most of fandom, to entertain all opinions -- but if you can't see what a gifted actor Davison is (I would say the strongest of the Classic Doctors), then seek help. Peter Davison inspired my first essay here, a four-part look at his career.

40. The Savages (First Doctor, 1966)
written by Ian Stuart Black
directed by Christopher Barry

Classic Doctor Who countdown (#50 - #41)

Continuing my countdown of Classic Who serials, from my least-liked to my most-loved. (For the previous ten, click here; to start from the top, click here. Or if you're looking for a particular serial, you can jump right to the index.) I think it tickles me that, as I begin my top-50 countdown, these next ten might be my most iconoclastic: to some, my most objectionable. A Seventh Doctor serial that many hate, from a season they hate even more (#45). A Third Doctor serial that, even among its cast and crew, has become a Doctor Who punchline (#48). And a couple of First Doctor marmites (#50, #44). I adore them all. When I wrote earlier about the Hartnell era, I hailed its unwillingness to settle on a formula; in Who's later years, when formulas have become standard, I gravitate towards the serials that surprise me -- that shake things up. I'm happiest when I see the creative team straining to do something different: angling for originality, for boldness in the face of complacency. When they do that, I'm more than willing to forgive the gaffes and misfires.

50. The Gunfighters (First Doctor, 1966)
written by Donald Cotton
directed by Rex Tucker

Classic Doctor Who countdown (#60 - #51)

Continuing my countdown of Classic Who serials, from my least-liked to my most-loved. (For the previous ten, click here; to start from the top, click here. Or if you're looking for a particular serial, you can jump right to the index.) It's been fascinating for me to rank the serials, and discover things about my own viewing preferences I never realized. I knew I liked the William Hartnell era (I devoted a three-part essay to it), but I didn't realize how much. But of my top-60 serials, Hartnell crops up more than any other Doctor (14 times, then 12 each for Tom Baker and Peter Davison). And although I'm fond of Hartnell himself, I don't respond to him as an actor the way I do Troughton or Davison -- so it's not because of him that I rate the era so high. I love its spirit. It's a creative team working without a net, with no template for what will work and what won't -- and even when they latch onto a winning formula, they're insistent not to repeat themselves. When the scope of your show is so broad -- all of time and space -- why would you repeat yourself? You never know what's coming next in the Hartnell era, and much of the time, it's masterful. Doctor Who would never again get so jazzed about being Doctor Who.

60. The Daleks' Master Plan (First Doctor, 1965-66)
written by Terry Nation and Dennis Spooner
directed by Douglas Camfield

Classic Doctor Who countdown (#70 - #61)

Continuing my countdown of Classic Who serials, from my least-liked to my most-loved. (For the previous ten, click here; to start from the top, click here. Or if you're looking for a particular serial, you can jump right to the index.) This ten includes two helmed by Douglas Camfield, my favorite Classic Who director. My top five would be Camfield, Derek Martinus, David Maloney, Paddy Russell and Fiona Cumming; I prize their taste and talent above the others, but I've never stopped to think if their serials are among my favorites. But I see that, of their combined 31 serials, over half are in my top 50, and 24 are in my top 50%. So although the limited budgets and time constraints meant that Classic Who was rarely a director's medium, there's no denying that the best of them had an enormous impact; as these five showed, they could elevate a modest story into a good one ("Galaxy 4," "Invasion of the Dinosaurs"), and a good story into a great one ("Castrovalva," "Terror of the Zygons," "The Deadly Assassin").

70. The Two Doctors (Sixth Doctor, 1985)
written by Robert Holmes
directed by Peter Moffatt