Favourite Jacqueline Hill, as Barbara Wright, performance?

Television Doctor Who (1963-1996)
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Happy Saturday all. Hope everyone has enjoyable plans for the weekend.

I was watching some First Doctor, and I must say my love for Jacqueline Hill has been reignited. I think for those first couple of seasons Barbara really stands out in her performance. So I was wondering what your top 3 performances were. Specifically the performance, even if the serial was sub-par.

Please give some reasons in the comments. If this gets some chat I’ll certainly do more polls.

  • An Uneartly Child
  • The Daleks/In Colour
  • The Edge of Destruction
  • Marco Polo
  • The Keys of Marinus
  • The Aztecs
  • The Sensorites
  • The Reign of Terror
  • Planet of Giants
  • The Dalek Invasion of Earth
  • The Rescue
  • The Romans
  • The Web Planet
  • The Crusade
  • The Space Museum
  • The Chase
0 voters
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1 The Aztecs
She is the main character for this episode and absolutly kills it. Still think it is in my top 3 companion focus serials. She is a badass in this one. :crown:

2 Planet of Giants
The fear she shows as she is dying is off the charts excellent. You really do feel for her as this terror really sets in.

3 The Keys to Marinus
Her almost drunk/high acting in the “hyno/fantasy” section was great. The lazy, almost mother talking down to a child performance was top notch. She knew what needed to be done and killed it.

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I need to watch them again, having only seen these stories once each (aside from The Daleks), but The Aztecs is of course a standout Barbara episode. She’s brilliant in it!

I also think she’s very assertive in An Unearthly Child. It’s thanks to her caring about Susan’s welfare that their adventures in time and space began!

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The Aztecs is such a good one for Barbara, but the one that sticks in my mind the most is definitely Edge of Destruction. “Accuse us? You ought to go down on your hands and knees and thank us! But gratitude’s the last thing you’ll ever have, or any sort of common sense either!” Edge of Destruction is so underrated in general, but specifically that speech from Barbara is one of my favorite moments. It’s a turning point for the show up to that point- before this episode the Doctor is extremely selfish, kidnapping Barbara and Ian because he doesn’t want him and Susan to be found out, lying about the TARDIS fluid link being broken to go and explore Skaro, just in general really not being a great person. The the tensions build in Edge of Destruction and Barbara snaps and just yells at the Doctor, and it’s basically what kick-starts the First Doctor’s entire character arc as he realizes yeah, maybe she was right about that. He sort of apologized to her at the end, and that’s kind of what starts them on the path of actually becoming friends. I love the First Doctor’s whole era because you get to watch him grow into more of the Doctor we know now, and a large part of that is the influence of Barbara (and Ian too).

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It will always be The Aztecs for me - Hill is amazing in that story and grabs hold of the focus on Barbara with both hands and runs with it. The scene where she confronts Tlotoxl after he tries to poison her and admits she isn’t a god - chef’s kiss (as the kids say).

I also agree about Planet of Giants and how she quietly realises what has happened but doesn’t want to worry her friends. So good.

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It’s the Aztecs. Easily her best Performance in the whole Show. Other than that, she was always a blast to watch!
I oddly enough also really like her Performance in the Rescue, although she killed Sandy :frowning:

5 Likes