The Talons of Weng-Chiang – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

The Doctor brings Leela to Victorian London to see how her ancestors lived, but is rapidly drawn into a fiendish plot involving Chinese tongs, disappearing women, an Oriental stage magician, a murderous ventriloquist’s dummy and giant rats in the sewers.

Had the pleasure of watching this story for the first time the other night… Well, over the course of two nights, as I watched the concatenated VHS version. The story represents a superb example of Doctor Who at its very finest – with great villains, atmosphere and fine location filming. Yes, I can see perfectly where some might label the story racist – with the whole business of those dash distrustful Chinese – but I wouldn’t dream of faulting it for that – and I can see why fans have rated the story so highly. I loved the Professor Lightfoot character and would have appreciated the chance to see a little more of him, perhaps as an ongoing companion rather than a one-off. He reminded me of Terry Jones for some reason… probably the manner of speech and facial expressions.

The giant rat proved the finest element, without doubt. A finer animal I have not seen since my childhood watching Rentaghost! I watched with my 10 year old son and he found it hilarious, as various members of the cast suffered vicious attacks from this dubious and utterly unconvincing predator of the Victorian London sewers. Perhaps Russel T. could bring the rats back for the next series?

It occured to me that the whole business of time radiation seems a bit… rum. I can forgive the whole business with the Dalek in the first season. The principle that the Dalek’s harnessed temporal technologies to power their regenerative and functional systems – faced with a time travelling enemy – seems to make sense. Technological advancement and war have always walked hand-in-hand, bringing some incredible (and innocuous) new gadgets from the likes of the World Wars of the 20th Century. So, when Rose touched the Dalek in the Van Staten’s museum, the technology embedded within the alien battle armour extrapolated essential energies from the temporal radiation in her touch to trigger regenerative systems.

However, the finale of the 2nd season of ‘the New Doctor Who’ saw the Dalek’s harness temporal energy from a random time traveller to interact with non-Dalek technology. Heck… I can’t be bothered to beat around the bush – Time Lord technology. Now, why would the Time Lords create something that could be activated by the touch of any time traveller? Or did the activation depend on the touch of someone exposed to the unique radiation signature of travel in a TARDIS? (suggesting that a Time Agent, like Captain Jack, pre-Doctor, would not have been able to provide the necessary temporal radiation signature). If the lock possessed a more general acceptance criteria for temporal radiation, then surely the Daleks could have opened it… as they must have travelled through time (and the Void) to get to Earth in 2007. I’m sure I won’t get an answer, but I’ve pondered it and had to set it down somewhere.

Wow! Just wow! I think it’s taken me a couple of days to assimilate that final episode. Doomsday was stand-out Who. From the revelation of the Genesis Arc; through the witty interchange between the Cybermen and the Daleks; to the solid, emotion-packed performances of the main actors. And that music – the baritone chanting heralding the Daleks; and the haunting theme backing the final moments between Rose and the Doctor. Just wow!