With an uncharacteristic burst of ambition, the Classic Capitology minions here at THT Towers are picking off some relatively low-hanging fruit and offering up a new set of caps for the Peter Davison two-parter The King’s Demons. A follow-up of sorts to the successful experimentation begun in Black Orchid as a two-episode (pseudo) historical, the relative revelation in putting these caps together was how visually appealing the story was, with a rather generous dollop of location filming taking place (something which would be repeated in the conclusion of the Davison trilogy of two-part stories The Awakening).
As should be expected from the length of the story, characterization is not at the fore here, certainly not with Ainley-being-Ainley at least, and the contrivances of separating Tegan and Turlough (especially!) are not well motivated. Kamelion is introduced here, and works well enough, though it wouldn’t be used again until it’s written out in Planet of Fire.
The curious thing to think about juxtaposing Nu-Who and a classic like The King’s Demons is that, given fairly similar running lengths to any modern stand-alone such as The Vampires of Venice or The Crimson Horror (both pseudo-historicals) how much more sedate the pacing is in The King’s Demons. This certainly isn’t a revelation, just a remark, but one wonders how current audiences would indulge this kind of storytelling today as anything more than a one-off change of pace.
The new set of caps for The King’s Demons once again drastically improve the breadth and quality over what previously sat on the Tour. Classic Capitology resumes next week, where will it all end, I ask you?
