Serial CC, in four parts:
- Part One - 9/10/66, 4.3m viewers
- Part Two - 9/17/66, 4.9m
- Part Three - 9/24/66, 4.2m
- Part Four - 10/1/66, 4.5m
Sound Bytes:
"The Smugglers is a self-contained historical tale, the likes of which was rapidly becoming extinct in Doctor Who by 1966. With Innes Lloyd now at the helm as series producer, the program[me]'s direction was increasingly characterized by monsters and science fiction settings. Where stories set in Earth's past did occur, the original production team's brief -- to include a strong educational history element -- had been distilled into a more basic requirement: to entertain first and foremost, with a 'rattling good yarn' being set against an often semi-authentic background. In this capacity, [The Smugglers] succeeds admirably." - from the liner notes of The Smugglers (BBC Radio Collection, 2002)
"A sweet little script. Hartnell is quite good, and by no means on his last legs." - review from The Discontinuity Guide by Cornell, Day and Topping (MonkeyBrain Books, 2004)
Comments:
The Smugglers is another lost story that's hard to evaluate. Before I could assign it a confident rating, I'd need answers to a few questions. Were the action scenes any good? Did the Cornwall location shooting really open up the story? And were the guest actors' on-screen performances too over-the-top, or just pleasingly broad?
Certainly, I don't get a very strong impression of the story from listening to the audio version. Like The Celestial Toymaker, this serial appears to have had strong visual appeal that is now lost. The few surviving clips are a collection of brutal stabbings and other gruesome deaths, and they suggest that the serial was well-directed and effective in its presentation of violence. But they're not much to go on.
Listening to the BBC Radio Collection version, I was struck by one really positive element -- the presentation of new(ish) companions Ben and Polly. They're not perfect characters, but they are arguably the best TARDIS crew since Ian, Barbara and Susan. Ben has a kind of everyman charm, and Polly is...well, quite prissy really, but likable nonetheless. (It certainly doesn't hurt that Anneke Wills was gorgeous.) Anyway, I quite like the scene in which they escape from a cell by tricking the guard into believing that they're wizards.
The guest cast was probably good, too. It's nice to see John Ringham (he of The Aztecs) back, and Paul Whitsun-Jones (who later appeared in The Mutants with Jon Pertwee) excels at playing fat, pompous officials like the Squire.
In all likelihood, this was a fun but inessential adventure. Interestingly, it represents a third incarnation for Doctor Who's historical serials. Such stories started out being deadly serious, then became increasingly comedic, and by the time of The Smuggers, the format mutated again into something decidedly romantic and action-oriented.
Grade: B- (perhaps)