City of Death [TV/1979.9.29 ~ 10.20]

★★★★★

  You often have Dr. Who adventures that are widely panned, or widely lauded. There are "underrated gems" and "overrated muck" in pretty much every Who range you can think of. You don't often get Dr. Who adventures that get almost universally praised, loved by the fandom with such passion... and that's why City of Death is such a special serial.

  This is the show at is most playful and confident; such a daunting and ambitious idea as... an alien split to seven different entities by time who sells genuine fake Mona Lisas (you read that right) to gather enough money to create a machine that will send him back to the creation of Earth to prevent his spacecraft from exploding and starting all this mess... leaps from the screen with such style, such assurance and an infectious aura. Filming the location scenes in France was perhaps one of the best ideas ever from the Graham Williams era, as the budding romance of Tom Baker of Lalla Ward is well documented inbetween their hilarious and ecstatically lovely scenes as the Doctor and Romana. Everyone seems to be having a ton of fun (including baddie Julian Glover, one of the best to ever do it), and the inclusion of fan favourite Duggan is the cherry on top. I have no idea why he, out of all the one-off Dr. Who character, doesn't have ten Big Finish boxsets dedicated to his character. He should.

  I'm afraid no truly original observations can come out of me, since this is one Who serial that's been written about to death (and rightfully so), but it really won't stop me from expressing my undying love for City of Death whenever I get the chance. Watching it is like sipping on a delectable bottle of wine and having the most wonderful cheese nibbles after; it's a fancy, silky-smooth trip through time, a truly creative and playful approach to time travel and priceless works of art, and a great big excuse for the crew to lounge around in Paris for a time. The result, needless to say, is absolutely gorgeous.