To escape from the volcanic eruption on Dulkis, the Second Doctor uses an emergency unit. It moves the TARDIS out of normal time and space. The travellers find themselves in an endless void where they are menaced by white robots.
Having regained the safety of the TARDIS, they believe they have escaped — until the ship explodes. They find themselves in a land of fiction, where they are hunted by life-size clockwork soldiers and encounter characters like Rapunzel, the Karkus, and Swift’s Lemuel Gulliver.
The Mind Robber is a very exciting story that takes place in the wonderous Land of Fiction. A world in which fiction becomes reality. The Doctor, Zoe, and Jamie are tasked with navigating through the world after the Tardis explodes, leading to them encountering several wacky monsters and characters. This story is incredibly creative, with some brilliant set design and clever writing throughout. The characters are all written great and there are some genuinely amazing comedic moments such as the way they write out Frazier Hines not being able to be in episode two.
I think the story suffers just a little bit at times from fatigue or repetitiveness, specifically the scenes of the labyrinth which aren’t the most exciting, but this is made up for by how great the rest of the story is.
Great inventive serial that I’d love to see them revisit, and a great second Doctor serial. Also contains Karkus, who triggered the forums nsfw detection software more then once in the past.
Will be irritated if they ever do a coloured version of this and stick the Master’s music in the scenes for the villain, as this is not the same Master…
Love The Mind Robber with its creativity, absurdity and overall fun. It might just be my favourite Two story (so far).
It can get a tad repetitive and the very end is abrupt with the TARDIS coming back together and then we just cut to credits but those are minor issues.
I am not as big of a fan of this as others are. It is fine don’t get me wrong I just don’t find it fantastic. This is what I wrote last time that I watched it:
I’m usually hesitant to use this word because of how overused it is in common parlance… but it is genuinely warranted here: This is peak Doctor Who. It is the pinnacle, the Platonic form, of the entire show. A showing of creativity and inventiveness where little things like budget or access to actors (that facial reconstruction gag might be the single greatest way to explain a performer’s absence in all of television) simply cannot hold back the raw imagination being poured into it. The show about a box that can go anywhere and everywhere, represented in its purest form by a story showing just how much ground that truly covers.
Even considering my weakness for metafiction, this represents such a pure ideal of what we as a species are capable of creatively, that I am just in awe of its existence.
I’m also firmly of the opinion that if Grant Morrison ever becomes showrunner, this is what every episode would be like and I have zero issue with that.
This is roughly where I’m at too. It’s definitely good maybe even great, but I’m not crazy about it either. I think the repeated ‘x foe isn’t real’ gets repetitive, especially as our cast seems so resistant to just saying the thing that has already saved their lives and will simply banish the monster. Zoe particularly, seems a lot dumber in this serial than her usual intelligence and spends a lot of time just screaming unfortunately.
I also wish that when the master and the doctor were in their ‘battle of wits’ fighting over the master brain, they were a bit more creative with it than just, summoning the next strongest character they can think of. If these two have the power to manipulate reality as if it is fiction, I would think both of them could do better than that
With that being said it is undoubtedly a unique and creative concept that does often land very well. It is one of the best examples of the limitless nature of Doctor Who being put to the test, and I do respect it a lot for that. I think it’s probably the second best serial of the season, even if in my eyes the end result doesn’t entirely live up to the fantastic concept
I couldn’t have had a more ideal introduction to this story, really. My dad had torrented the entire classic series and would regularly pick out interesting ones to show me. So, I was a kid who already loved Doctor Who, already had an appreciation for the black and white era, and my tiny child mind was blown.
Every now and then afterward I would wonder if it could be as good as I remember – and it is, every time. It’s about as close as Doctor Who ever gets to a perfect story.
It also stars my favourite Doctor with arguably his best lineup of companions, so it’s got a hell of a lot going for it.
So I have watched episode one so far and that was NOT what I was expecting. However, I’m deeply excited and I’m enjoying it! It’s well shot, well acted, and that ending??? Honestly I have such high hopes.
Update, finished it though it is very early in the morning. It is a very good serial though, picks up from whatever dominators was, and is just peak!! Ill properly review later though. I need to sleep
An acid trip of a story that is a better version of The Celestial Toymaker. The serial clips along at a decent pace. The variety of sets, and situations, make this a very engaging story. The imagination of the writers is poured into every aspect of the story. The costuming is excellent, and the set design is top-notch too.
Also, this one gets bonus points for the famous shot of Wendy Padbury hanging onto the TARDIS console.
It’s honestly such a creative and well-executed serial. I’d say it’s peak Troughton, but War Games, Web of Fear, and Enemy of the World all exist (Mind Robber still gets top 5 though)
I swore I wrote something here before but can’t seem to find it.
This is one of my favorite Troughton stories. It’s such an ambitious and fun story. I like how they did something creative instead of just oh Jamie is kidnapped this week or off on his own mission they just had Jamie played by a different actor and it worked in the format of this. The doctor is great and this and almost falling into the fiction traps and having to speak a certain way. I love the way that the threats are able to leave in the most plot armory way possible. Medusa, centaur, etc doesn’t exist therefore it can’t hurt us. I do the think Zoe karkus fight was funny
I really wish RTD had us going back here at the end of gatwas second season
I love it when Doctor Who gets a bit weird, and this really delivers on that. Part One is the strongest, but the rest is still top tier Doctor Who. This story has joined The Evil of The Daleks and The Enemy of the World as one of my favourite 2 stories
This one was such a fun episode. I think my favorite part was how the Doctor was always reminding them that they can’t be afraid but when a being from Zoe’s fiction comes up the role has to change. She’s like ‘you know he’s not real.’ And he’s like ‘do I? I’ve never heard of it before. How do I know?’
Bizarrely the discussion link for this story was missing from the site, so my first job was rectifying that!
I have always adored this story and having rewatched if over the last week, I came away feeling no different. I love how inventive the whole story is and how it takes Doctor Who into a world that has quite obviously influenced it from day one and makes that world the one the Doctor is actually interacting with.
How lucky were we that Frazer Hines got chicken pox during this story? Normally he’d just be written out badly for an episode (much like he is in the next story). Instead we get the joy that is Hamish Wilson managing to match Jamie’s mannerisms and vocal inflections whilst also making Jamie his own - all in the space of 25 minutes. I genuinely believe Wilson is one of Who’s unsung heroes.
Troughton, Hines and Padbury are all on top form throughout the story from the bizarre opening episode to the battle of wits in Episode 5. The clockwork soldiers and white robots are iconic. The various story characters are fun and brilliantly performed.
The only place I think it falters is the sudden revelation that the Master Brain is planning on invading Earth. It makes the entire thing far too ‘ordinary’ in terms of Doctor Who. It just doesn’t fit with the rest of the story and feels like something that was added in because someone somewhere thought this world needed an ‘explanation’. It could easily have existed without it, with the threat just being the concept of the Doctor being trapped by the Brain in this world of fiction.
But it’s a minor gripe within a whole host of brilliant stuff.
