Terence Bayler | Through the Shattered Lens

The War Games is an episode of firsts and lasts.

It featured the last regular appearance by Patrick Troughton as the Second Doctor. (Troughton would return for three guest appearances.) Having played the role for three years, Troughton feared getting typecast and felt it was time to leave. It was also the last episode to feature Frazer Hines (as Jamie) and Wendy Padbury (as Zoe) as companions. (Hines holds the record for appearing in the most episodes as a companion.) Finally, this episode was the last to be broadcast in black-and-white.

The War Games also featured a very important first. This episode featured the first appearance of the Time Lords and the first trip to their home planet. This was the first episode that showed the society that the Doctor fled when he stole his TARDIS and went to Earth.

At ten episodes, The War Games was either the second or third-longest serial in Doctor Who history, depending on whether or not you count The Trial of the Time Lord as just one long (and regrettable) serial. The serial opens with the Doctor and his companions apparently landing in No Man’s Land during World War I. As things progress, the Doctor notices anachronistic technology and Jamie is shocked when a redcoat shows up in a World War I prison. The Doctor discovers that an alien known as The War Lord (Philip Madoc) has determined that humanity is the most bloodthirsty race in the universe and that he has abducted soldiers from Earth’s bloodiest wars. They are fighting war games on The War Lord’s planet and the survivors will become the members of the War Lord’s army. Helping the War Lord is the War Chief (Edward Brayshaw), a renegade Time Lord.

(Just as with The Time Meddler‘s Monk, there’s a fan theory that the War Chief was an early incarnation of The Master. I don’t believe it, myself. The Master was far more cunning than The War Chief.)

Despite running for four hours, The War Games is a rare Doctor Who serial that doesn’t have any slow spots and the scenes where the characters cross from war zone to war zone are creatively realized. The serial starts out as if it’s going to be yet another dry historical episode and then it gradually reveals that all is not as it seems. I especially liked the performance as Jane Sherwin as Lady Julia, an ambulance driver in the World War I zone. (Jane Sherwin was also the wife of Doctor Who’s then-produccer Derek Sherwin.)

What really makes The War Games stand out is the final episode.

Having brought an end to the War Games, the Doctor is faced with the impossible prospect of returning the soldiers to their proper times. He is forced to call upon The Time Lords for help. Bernard Horsfall, Trevor Martin, and Clyde Pollitt appear as the Time Lords, who dematerialize the War Lord and send the soldiers back home with no memory of what happened. Unfortunately, The Time Lords are not just going to let the Doctor off the hook for violating their police of non-interference.

First, Jamie and Zoe are sent back to their original times, both with no memory of their life on board the TARDIS. The Doctor is then put on trial for having stolen his TARDIS and interfering in time and space. The Doctor argues that he has been fighting evil. The Time Lords accept his argument and then say that his punishment is to be sent to 20th Century Earth. He’ll keep his TARDIS but he won’t be able to use it. And, because the Doctor is well-known on Earth, he’ll have to regenerate. He’s given five faces and told to pick one. The Doctor refuses them all. The Time Lords pick one. “That’s the worst one!” the Doctor says before he finds himself spinning through space and time.

It’s a poignant ending to the Second Doctor’s adventures. The Time Lords do not come across as being as bad as the Doctor often made them out to be but it is easy to see why an adventurer like the Doctor would feel constrained by their society. That the Second Doctor called them for help despite knowing what the consequences would be not only shows how dangerous The War Lord’s plan was but also how the Doctor would always do the right thing even when it was dangerous for him to do so. The Time Lords could have just as easily dematerialized The Doctor as punishment for stealing his TARDIS. Jamie and Zoe are spared punishment but they lose their memories of the amazing adventures they shared. And the Doctor changes once again.

For viewers like me, who got to know Doctor Who from the episodes that were broadcast late at night on PBS, The War Games is a bridge between “old” Doctor Who and the classic era of Jon Pertwee and Tom Baker. In America, we didn’t get to see much of Patrick Troughton’s Doctor but what we got established him as one of the best to ever play the role.

The 1993 Best Picture nominee The Remains of the Day is a love story. Actually, it’s a series of love stories. Every character in the film is in love with something or someone. It’s just that, with one exception, they’re all so extremely British that it’s sometimes hard to tell.

The one exception is an American congressman named Trent Lewis (Christopher Reeve). As the film opens in the 1950s, he’s just purchased Darlington Hall, which is one of those country manors that hold so much history and romance for those of us who regularly watch Downton Abbey. Lewis is excited to have a British manor of his very own. It even comes with its very own butler, a Mr. Stevens (Anthony Hopkins).

As we see in flashback, Stevens previously worked at Darlington Hall when it was owned by Lord Darlington (James Fox). In the 1930s, Lord Darlington may have loved Britain but he was also dangerously naive about the rise of Nazi Germany. Actually, to say that he was naive might be letting Lord Darlington off too easily. When we first meet Lord Darlington, he seems like a well-meaning but hopelessly out-of-touch aristocrat. He has so little understanding of the real world that he even asks Stevens to have the sex talk with his godson (played, somewhat inevitably, by Hugh Grant), who happens to be close to 30 years old at the time and, one would presume, far beyond the age when the talk is really necessary. When we first see Lord Darlington, who is hosting a conference on how to best deal with the rise of the Nazis, arguing that Britain should ignore the rise of Hitler, it’s easy to assume that he’s just as clueless about Germany as he is about his godson. But then, eventually, Lord Darlington orders Stevens to fire two Jewish maids and you’re forced to reconsider everything that you previously believed about him.

And then there’s Ms. Kenton (Emma Thompson), who worked as a housekeeper for Lord Darlington. She loves the repressed Mr. Stevens but continually finds herself frustrated by Stevens’s professional detachment. Unlike Stevens, Ms. Kenton doesn’t hold back on her opinions but, when she finally has a chance to stand up for her beliefs and defy the status quo at Darlington Hall, she backs down.

And then there’s Mr. Stevens. Mr. Stevens may be one of the most emotionally repressed characters in the history of the movies but the entire film revolves around trying to figure out what or who Stevens loves. It’s a little too easy to assume that he’s in love with Ms. Kenton, even though that will be the natural instinct of most viewers. While he obviously feels affection towards her, he can never bring himself to truly express it. (That said, getting a letter from her appears to be the only thing that can actually inspire him to leave the safety of Darlington Hall and venture into the outside world.) While it seems, at times, that he might love Lord Darlington, Stevens himself prefers to say that he respected Lord Darlington and, after the war, Stevens seems to have no trouble staying on at Darlington Hall even after its bought by Congressman Lewis. Much like the ghosts in The Shining, Stevens has always been the butler and always will be.

Ultimately, Mr. Stevens loves his job. He loves being a butler. He’s a man so dedicated to his job that he even continues to work even while his father is dying in the next room. He loves making sure that everything’s perfect at Darlington Hall and he never bothers with worrying about how imperfect the world outside Darlington Hall may be. In that way, Stevens is a stand-in for all of the European leaders who willfully chose to ignore what was happening in Germany in the days leading up to World War II. And, much like those European leaders, he finds himself forced to work for an American in the aftermath.

As a film, The Remains of the Day can be frustrating but in a good way. Mr. Stevens is such a repressed and detached character that, much like Ms. Kenton, we’re always tempted to give up on him. Fortunately, Anthony Hopkins is one of those actors who can suggest so much with just a pause in his dialogue or a quick glance to the side. You look at his sad eyes and suddenly, you know everything that Mr. Stevens cannot bring himself to say. Emma Thompson has a somewhat easier role because Ms. Kenton at least gets to say what she’s thinking but she still bring a lot of depth to the role and has a lot of chemistry with Hopkins. And finally, you’ve got James Fox who is so comically befuddled that it’s all the more shocking to consider all of the pain that he — intentionally or not — is partially responsible for.

The Remains of the Day is a great film for all of us Downton Abbey-loving history nerds.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nlyIvHY1Xw