Vox Nova At The Tele: Doctor Who, The Fires of Pompeii

Back in 2000, when there was no indication that Doctor Who would ever return to television, a small company, Big Finish, was producing new full-cast Doctor Who audio adventures featuring actors from the classic television series. One of the stories was The Fires of Vulcan, featuring Sylvester McCoy (the seventh Doctor) in a historical drama concerning the destruction of Pompeii. Central to the story was the question of destiny – what could the Doctor do in a situation which was beyond his control? To make matters worse, he believed that when he would visit Pompeii, his life would be over. He had seen evidence that his TARDIS would be trapped Vesuvius’ lava. Was there any way he could overcome fate and come out alive?

For the second story of the fourth season of the new Doctor Who series, The Fires of Pompeii, the Doctor returns to Pompeii right before its destruction. The question of fate once again is a major theme. This time it is not about his own personal fate, but the fate of the city and the people within it. In this story, the Doctor discovers what caused Vesuvius to erupt. He also finds out that he is leaving traces of his adventures in the time-stream, which the seers of Pompeii were able to pick up on and use to help a new alien menace, the Pyroviles, try to take make the earth their new home.

For the fan of the classic series, there is much to like. It feels more like a classic story than many of the others which have been produced under Russell T. Davies. Of course, it does bring in elements from the new series’ sensibility which drags it down and prevents it from being an all-out classic. For myself, the fact that the people of Pompeii seem to be presented in ways which mimic modern society was the worst example of this. Of course, Doctor Who has not always been serious in its historical stories, nor always accurate, but in a story which tries to get much right, it still gets so much wrong; anyone wanting a story which gets the historical situation correct will find this story disappoints. Moreover, the characterization of the Doctor will get many fans upset, because he seems to want to let fate overcome his heroic nature, and it takes the demands of his companion, Donna Noble, to convince the Doctor to do the right thing at the end, and to find a way to save at least one family from the destruction of Pompeii.

Nonetheless, the weaknesses of the episode tend to be secondary to the story itself; they can distract, but they do not prevent the tale from being an enjoyable, well-crafted adventure worthy of the Doctor Who name. The Doctor finds himself in a society which confuses even himself – where seers and augurs have the gift to see him for who he is, even into the mystery of his identity, a mystery which was brought to light during the seventh Doctor’s era, and has suddenly returned to the forefront of the show this season.

The production values for this story are second to none for Doctor Who: filmed in Italy, using sets from HBO’s Rome, Doctor Who has never been able to situate itself in history as well as with this story. But there is a science fiction story at the heart of this episode, and the alien menace, the Pyroviles, a species of living stone with magma for its “blood”, was simple but satisfactory in their execution.

7.5/10

As a side note, the story ended with the typical, now trite, “ancient people would confuse science with the power of the gods” mentality found within many science fiction stories. Of course, this is not the first time it has happened in Doctor Who: in The Myth Makers, the Doctor was confused with Zeus. It would have been interesting if some mention of this had been made within the story, especially since the Doctor’s visited was predicted by the Sibylline Oracles. I suspect no one thought about making such a connection, because it wouldn’t have taken much to do so, but it would have been the kind of nod to the classic series Doctor Who fans would have appreciated.