ZZ5 - The War Games 5

The Chief Scientist, as played by Vernon Dobtcheff, is a very gullible fellow. The Doctor manages to dupe him on a couple of occasions into thinking his intentions are legitimate. The Chief Scientist is also very weird, but I'll put this down mostly to Dobtcheff's unique countenance and vocal delivery.

The building rivalry, bordering on mutual hatred, between the War Chief and the Security Chief is fascinating to watch. Kind of like in The Dominators, where the strife between the two main antagonists almost caused their plans to grind to a halt while both Rago and Toba slugged it out amidst a sea of disembodied Quarks, so too do the plans of the (as yet unseen) War Lord threaten to be stamped out by the incessant bickering of these two. I'm also a fan of the War Chief's medallion. At first I thought it was just a piece of decoration, but, in this episode, it his hinted at as a source of his power.

This is the last episode for Lady Jennifer. A lesser story would have killed her off after she had outlived her usefulness in the story. But the budding, prim and proper romance between her and Lieutenant Carstairs in this story thus far has been very sweet, and I'm glad to see that the good Lady is kept out of harm's way for the duration of the story.

Throughout the course of the Chronic Hysteresis, I've tried to watch one, maybe two episodes, then write reviews about them. However, The War Games is becoming like a good book. I just can't put it down. I watched four episodes in a row on an early Saturday morning instead of sleeping in, and I had to stop myself from watching a fifth. Who knew that ten-part episodes could be so damned good?