“City of Death” is an adventure of the seventeenth season of “Doctor Who” classic series which aired in 1979. It follows “Destiny of the Daleks” and it’s a four parts adventure written by David Agnew and directed by Michael Hayes.

The story

The Fourth Doctor (Tom Baker) and Romana II (Lalla Ward) are on vacation in Paris when they start perceiving temporal distortions. During a visit to the Louvre, they meet Countess Scarlioni, who’s wearing a bracelet that contains alien technology she uses to scan the security systems of the Mona Lisa.

When the Doctor and Romana are approached by Inspector Duggan, they discover that Count Scarlioni and his wife are involved in the illegal dealing of lost artworks. His fear is that they want to steal the Mona Lisa but in the Count’s palace Dr. Kerensky’s conducting time experiments that suggest that there’s something more behind their activities.

Extras

This DVD is rich in extras: in fact, though it’s just a four parts adventure, it’s a two DVDs edition. There are typical contents such as production subtitles and a gallery of pictures from this adventure.

There are comments in the adventure alternative audio track by actors Julian Glover and Tom Chadbon and director Michael Hayes.

Paris in the Springtime. A 45-minute documentary on the production of this adventure. All the stages of the creation of “City of Death” are covered, from the original story to the one then recorded. It also includes excerpts from two interviews with Douglas Adams with his towel.

Paris, W12. Excerpts from various films documenting the recording of this adventure. It’s basically a filler.

Prehistoric Landscapes. A montage of special effects not used on the primeval Earth.

Chicken Wrangler. Some unused clips that use real chickens.

Eye on… Blatchford. A spoof-documentary that tells the story of Sardoth, the penultimate Jagaroth, in a comic tone.

The Doctor Who Annual 1980. The 1980 issue of the magazine “The Doctor Who Annual” in PDF format.

At the end of the adventure a trailer for “Creature from the Pit” starts automatically.

There are also four “Easter eggs” scattered here and there. By far the most interesting one is an additional piece of interview with Douglas Adams who talks about his hilarious trip to Paris during the recording of “City of Death”. It’s probably the best “Easter egg” ever seen in a “Doctor Who” DVD.

Initially, writer David Fisher wrote a story titled “The Gamble With Time”, which drew inspiration from the stories of the detective Bulldog Drummond but with a humorous tone. Originally, the story was set in Las Vegas but it was later moved to France and Monte Carlo. Producer Graham Williams thought that recording part of the adventure in France would be a good advertisement for “Doctor Who” because the series had never been filmed abroad. This proved feasible however it required a rewrite of the script because it was set in the ’20s but they could only shoot scenes on the streets of Paris as they were.

At that point, David Fisher was busy with other work so Graham Williams and script editor Douglas Adams worked together for more than three days almost with no interruption to rewrite the script obtaining “City of Death”. For this reason, the author is officially David Agnew, a pseudonym often used within BBC.

Filming in Paris proved more difficult than expected due to various problems. Still, “City of Death” includes several scenes in the French capital city that make up a good excuse to have some padding, a typical system used in the classic series of “Doctor Who” to fill a little time.

Nevertheless, the result was brilliant. “The Gamble With Time” was already a comedy, the contribution of Douglas Adams in “City of Death” with witty lines in his style made this adventure one of the funniest of “Doctor Who” and in general one of the most popular of the show. Adams even used some ot its ideas when he wrote his novel “Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency”.

The funny side of “City of Death” is highlighted in the contrast between the behavior of the very serious Count Scarlioni and his wife and that of the Doctor, Romana and Inspector Duggan. The Count in particular is very intense and over the course of the adventure there’s a progressive discovery of the reasons that led him to be an illegal artworks dealer to make the money to pay for time experiments. His opposite is Duggan, always ready to use violence, even when not needed, but in such a way as to make him a parody.

Although it’s a comedy, the plot of “City of Death” is complex, starting from the Paris of the present and being developed to include various eras of the past. Therefore, it’s a story that fully uses the concept of time travel, not only to bring the Doctor and Romana to an adventure in a certain historical period. At the same time it’s unusual because in “Doctor Who” there are few stories in which the comedy side is so marked, well covering some moments that analyzed really look like plotholes.

At that time not everyone was enchanted by the rather unique style of “City of Death” but overall it was a great success with an audience peak. Over the years it built an outstanding reputation and it’s always in the top 10 of all polls about the classic series adventures.

The result is excellent also thanks to good performances by Tom Baker and Lalla Ward as well as of the guest cast. The possibility to record part of “City of Death” in Paris, despite various problems, enriches its production values, which were often a problem in the classic “Doctor Who” series because of its limited budget.

Overall, “City of Death” is really a brilliant sci-fi comedy and after watching it you won’t be able to look at the Mona Lisa the same way ever again. 😉 Also considering the wealth in the quantity and quality of the extras in this mini-boxset, I definitely recommend buying it.