The Gunfighters

Suffering from a toothache, the Doctor puts the TARDIS down looking for some aid. The ship does not provide the best location for this and lands in Tombstone, Arizona, in October 1881 just before the infamous shoot out at the OK Corral. Dodo and Steven launch themselves into their roles as a tacky cowgirl and cowboy, unaware that the Clantons are in town looking for Doc Holliday. The Doctor, however, discovers that Holliday is the very dentist he seeks but a case of mistaken identity follows and lands him right in the Clanton family crosshairs, with Johnny Ringo not too far behind...

The Gunfighters is one of those stories which craws wildly differing opinions from fans; it is either loved or hated - there has yet to be anyone who was only mildly receptive to it. I'm one of the "love it" team although it's not hard to see why the "hate it" camp has such a hard time enjoying it; in fact the reasons are pretty much the same either side of the coin.

For starters it's a comedy. Some say that there is no room in Doctor Who for comedy and would not have enjoyed The Romans either for the same reason (wow - that seems like so long ago now) but when it's done right it's fine. I wouldn't say this is done exactly right but it's humourous enough and doesn't have a laugh track. I get a kick out of the small stuff like Steven tripping over his spurs when he walks, his cabaret act (at gunpoint) with Dodo at the Last Chance Saloon, and the interplay between the Doctor and any of the supporting cast. My favourite has to be the Doctor's experience at the dentist office as he realizes this is not the height of dental professionalism.

The supporting cast are... well... painful to watch sometimes. All those fake American accents just sound so bad and corny; thankfully Steven and Dodo give it up by the end of episode one and the Doctor never tries it on. But there is not much menace to be had in a shaky voice trying to sound tough in an accent that is not it's own. And as for Johnny Ringo... he looks like he's headed for an old gay bar I knew of called Badlands in his all black (of course - cause he's a bad guy!) attire and his tough guy smoking act.

Then there's the matter of the music. This was the first time lyrical music was used as incidental, and to an extent the lyrical stylings of Lynda Baron as she sings "The Ballad of the Last Chance Saloon" serve as a bit of narration between acts as well. This sort of thing would not happen again until 1987's Delta and the Bannermen and even then it would not be to the same effect. The song has been added as a bonus to one of the audio releases of the story; one is the actual audio track with linking narration (which is baffling as this episode exists in its entirety and can be watched) and the other is a straight up reading of the novelization.

The big redeemer though is the sets - they're fantastic! As with The Ark there is a lot of overhead work and even a second floor to the saloon set, and the streets of Tombstone are actually pretty well designed and well shot to look bigger than they are. There's an obvious jump to a film stage for the OK Corral scenes and the opening where the Clantons ride into town on their horses, and even that looks good for the time.

I had mentioned the novelization of the story earlier; Donald Cotton provided one for this tale and very much in the style of The Romans and The Myth Makers the printed version plays up the comedy element some more. I had seen the televised episode before the novel was published and as such was not thrown off by the variances between screen and page... well not too much.

There are no real continuity points in this one; the premise of the Doctor's toothace is started at the final seconds of The Celestial Toymaker and there are no references to other adventures to cite aside from that and the fact that Steven and Dodo are still wearing the same clothes from that episode. The story does end with the Doctor, Steven and Dodo landing on another planet in an age of peace and prosperity, but it's not out of the question to suppose they had a couple other adventures in between them...

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