In his biography in the original publication of "The Hitch-Hiker's Guide To The Galaxy", Douglas Adams
notes that at various times he had worked as a hospital porter, barn builder, chicken shed cleaner,
bodyguard, radio producer and script editor of Doctor Who. The excellent South Bank Show on Adams
in 1992 manages to avoid mentioning his work for everyone's favourite Saturday tea-time science fiction
show, despite including some discussion of his time working as a bodyguard. So it is clear that Douglas
Adams did not see DOCTOR WHO as a major part of his life and his career, despite what many fans might
like to believe.
However, if Doctor Who had little effect on Douglas N Adams, the reverse cannot be said to be true.
Doctor Who fans are keen to divide the series into easily digestible eras, either by lead actor,
decade or producer. However, the impact of the script editor on the content and style of the show has
seldom been subject to the same sort of rigorous categorisation. Which is a bit strange, since it is
the script editor who is generally chiefly responsible for a show's style and content. And nowhere is
this more clear than in Season 17.
We all know that when Graham Williams was appointed as producer of the show he was instructed to
remove the gothic horror that had been perceived to be the defining concern of his predecessor.
Williams observed that this would leave a void, which he aimed to fill with humour. However, whilst
stories such as "The Sun Makers", "The Ribos Operation" and "The Androids of Tara" had flirted
with the concept of Doctor Who as a comedy, it was Douglas Adams who wined and dined it before a
passionate night of ecstasy and a post-coital cigarette.
It clearly all started in "The Pirate Planet". The basic ingredients were much as many other stories -
an oppressed population is ruled by a nasty villain who the Doctor overthrows with the help of a local
resistance group. It hardly sounds promising, especially given the struggle of the show in the
late 70s to achieve credible production values within its budgetary constraints. However, the story
is saved by a wit and a desire to play with the expectations and form of science fiction that we
now see as the trademarks of Adams but which must have been startling at the time.
And then we come to Season 17 itself. Fortunately, the season for which Douglas Adams acted as script
editor had been enjoying an enhanced reputation even before the death of its creator - long gone
are the times when DWM told us that it was the silly pointless era before nice Mr Nathan-Turner
came along and gave us proper science fiction again. Indeed, Season 17 may not provide the most
though provoking and well crafted stories in the history of Doctor Who - but it is one of the most
entertaining sequence of episodes.
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"Whilst earlier stories had flirted
with the concept of Doctor Who as a comedy, it was Douglas Adams who wined and dined it before a
passionate night of ecstasy and a post-coital cigarette."
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The centrepiece of the season is of course "City of Death". There has been much said and written
about these four episodes which I don't particularly need to add to, other than by saying that
it's really quite good.
There are other stories of the season which are officially credited to other writers but clearly
have the fingerprints of Adams all over them - "Destiny of the Daleks" and "The Creature from the
Pit" in particular. Adams had no qualms about making jokes about any part of the show's format or
heritage, much to the dismay of the continuity obsessed fan-boy trying to work out why Romana
wasted four regenerations on a whim but to the amusement of the rest of us. Humour is everywhere.
And it is particular fortunate that Adams found himself with an enthusiastic partner in crime in
the form of Tom Baker. And unlike the show's mid-80s attempt to replace violence with comedy,
Adams managed to produce comedy Doctor Who that was actually funny.
And that brings us to "Shada". Given Adams reputation as a novelist for struggling to finish a
novel within any deadline it is somewhat ironic that he was the writer behind the only uncompleted
Doctor Who story. It is difficult to pass judgement on the story from the footage that was shot.
However, the material that was completed does include more classic Adams lines and characters.
Chief amongst these is of course Professor Chronotis, who Adams must have particularly liked
since he subsequently gave him his own novel.
The death of Douglas Adams at such a young age is clearly a tragic loss. But I'm sure I'm not alone
in wondering what that means for the chances of getting novelisations of his stories. Adams didn't
want to do it himself, particularly due to the pay being several zeroes shorter than his normal
advances. Of course, a novelisation is probably redundant in the multi-media world that we now
inhabit. And if we really want to read "City of Death" and "Shada" we can at least read
"Dirk Gentley's Holistic Detective Agency", which scores over any potential novelisation of the
original stories through having an Electric Monk in it. Douglas Adams's contribution to Doctor Who is
something that we can now watch whenever we want. And it represents an era of Doctor Who that always
makes for entertainment, even 20 years later. And there's no better tribute to Douglas Adams than that.
Originally published in KKLAK! issue 6 (September 2001).
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