Doctor Who: The Moonbase

Last updated on: February 7, 2012 at 8:18 am by James F. McGrath

Doctor Who: The Moonbase 2012-02-07T08:18:19-05:00 James F. McGrath

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In the episode “The Moonbase” the Doctor visits the result of Newt Gingrich’s promise. The episode witnesses the return of the Cybermen (the first time I saw part of this episode, I wasn’t aware of just how recently the Cybermen had appeared, and that for the first time). The moonbase is the location of a gravitron which is used to control Earth’s weather.

We so much take for granted that people have been to the moon and will be again that it would be easy to forget that when this episode aired, no one had yet been to the moon. The wearing of spacesuits and hopping in the low lunar gravity that viewers got to see in part 1 had yet to be actually experienced by human beings – although since this episode aired for the first time in 1967, humanity did not have long to wait. I emphasize this to draw attention to the fact that an episode like this inevitably seems different to us from our perspective in time than it would have to its first watchers.

In relation to religion and Doctor Who, it is worth quoting the Doctor’s statement on morality: “There are some corners of the universe which have bred the most terrible things. Things that act against everything we believe in. They must be fought.”

Two of the four parts of the episode are lost, but there are animated restorations with the original soundtrack:

Other than that, there is little that needs to be commented on than to suggest that someone propose to Newt Gingrich the potential for a moonbase that control’s Earth’s weather – and warn him about the threat from the Cybermen. And you may enjoy a Saturday Night Live skit that allows you to explore that future further in a comical manner – one that is a moon’s distance away from the Doctor Who episode:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JfUHIowew7E

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