Director Charles Lawrence has personalized the project to the point that shutting it down would mean the end of his career, and he reluctantly has UNIT to help him get things back to normal ASAP. However, Dr. John Quinn, Lawrence's number two, seems to be involved in something with his assistant Ms. Dawson. A potholer himself, he is in contact with certain beings who have promised him a higher form of scientific knowledge. Could they be the party involved?
The Doctor and Liz discover that the neuroses rate is 200% above the normal and involves humans who worked at one time in the cyclotron room, which is the deepest part of the caves. The caves are the key to the mystery.
Certain episodes have a theme. Episode 3 has a military theme, with a military search operation filled with choppers, dogs, soldiers, flares being fired. It ends with the object of that search, a Silurian, making its first detailed appearance. Episode 6 is the frenzied crisis episode, with people succumbing to a Silurian virus, collapsing with facial discolourations, ambulances and police appearing in the streets, and the Doctor and Liz working to make an antidote from various medicines.
Big goof: in Episode 7, Liz says "Van Allen Belt" when she should have said "ozone layer." And she's a doctor of science to boot! Shame on you, Liz!
Of the guest stars, Fulton MacKay plays the charmingly smooth Dr. Quinn, effectively showing him as someone who is driven by wanting to attain superior scientific knowledge to the point of personal greed. However, his palaeontology and geology leaves much to be desired. He makes references to the Silurian era, yet the Allosaurus is clearly from the Jurassic Period. The Doctor later goofs things up when encountering their cousins the Sea Devils in the story of the same name, naming the Eocene epoch as their time of origin, at which time Allosaurus were extinct.
Peter Miles plays Dr. Lawrence as a career-driven adminstrator. He is best known as Nyder in the Who story Genesis Of The Daleks. Norman Jones (Major Baker) later played Hieronymous in The Masque Of Mandragora. And a young Geoffrey Palmer (As Time Goes By series) plays Permanent Undersecretary Masters.
The second televised Jon Pertwee story demonstrates that 7-episode stories work if they are effectively utilized, and The Silurians is a prime example of that. There's suspense, a good story, the conflict between peace and diplomacy versus military power, factionalism within a civilization (peaceful versus racist as seen in the Old Silurian and New Silurian), and the dangers of nuclear power, especially at a time when it was seen as a cheap way to make electric power. A strong story to follow the classic Spearhead From Space.
Some unexplained deaths in the underground caverns seem unconnected but soon it becomes clear that a dormant race of reptilian creatures who were part of an advanced society before the onset of the Ice Age have been awakened and are intent on reclaiming what is rightfully theirs, the earth.
The story is set in the still continuing cold war background at a time when there was also an energy crisis. Both of these themes are strongly in evidence in the script. The new Doctor is seen to be an opponent of force as his previous incarnations have also been but in this Doctor, the role of peacemaker is much more prominent. He is determined to seek peace between the Silurians and the warm bloods but is twarted in this by the machinations of the military among UNIT, the security staff at the research station and among the Silurians themselves.
His attempts to secure peace fail and he is deceived into believing that the Silurians will merely be sealed off in their caves only to find that the caves themselves are destroyed.
These early depictions of the Pertwee Doctor point to a more principled, outspoken Doctor than in the past who is not prepared to put up with the jingoistic claptrap that comes from the Brigadies. This eventually changes which is why I admit to preferring the early Pertwee espisodes to the later.
This is Dr Who at its best. The storyline is intelligent and well-thought-out, the characters are strong (Pertwee is a likeable eccentric/gentleman version of the central character), there are some great pieces of dialogue (the 'house of rats' analogy, for example), and despite the length of the story (7 episodes) there is no padding to speak of. The incidental music sometimes borders on the idiotic, but that minor detail doesn't detract from this fine tale.
The Doctor must move quickly to arrest a devistating power, active once more after millions of years of hibernation...
Another GREAT Jon Pertwee story! If you liked "The Green Death", "Inferno" and "The Sea Devils", you will thoroughly enjoy "The Silurians". This is another great Doctor Who classic that can be enjoyed by the whole family!
