Now this is an interesting Target, much more adult in tone than any of the contemporary or previous ones. And I mean 'adult' as in trying to give the characters realistic thoughts and motivations, not as in Ace having her cherry popped by Glitz. If only the NAs had gone the way of this one. It's by 'John Lydecker' which apparently is Stephen Gallagher's pen name.
There's a prologue describing how the privateer (the freighter is always so called) comes to be at the gateway in the first place: its engines get damaged by missile fire just before it goes into warp. The attack is the work of the 'Antonine Killers', who are or form part of an anti-slavery alliance. It's implied, but not explicitly stated, that they're Tharils.
The stuff on the ship about the time rift, and the coin-tossing, is entirely absent. Instead we get the thoughts of different crew members, and of Biroc as he sees E-Space with his time sense. There's a running device with the readouts from Packard's console, showing how damaged the ship is. (And including 'special circumstances quotes', something I've always longed to add to one of my own applications).
All the ship scenes have less broad comedy (Lane doesn't ineffectually try to put out the electrical fire, for example) and more unsettling images and matter-of-fact descriptions of cruelty. We follow the thoughts of several of the crew members, but it only shows us how amoral they are. There's a sort of 'banality of evil' thing going on here.
When we join the TARDIS, Romana suggests that they need help from Gallifrey. The Doctor won't hear of it.
Adric's coin was given to him by a Decider when he was seven. He thinks about the I Ching in a convincing mathematical way - this is the only time that I ever believed in Adric as someone who could have won a badge for mathematical excellence.
'Romana, meanwhile, was plainly irritated. It showed in the way that she stirred the boxed components about, as if she'd lost track of what she was looking for.' Do you see what I mean about the more adult tone?
Biroc wears a swashbuckler's shirt, and, excellently, 'he might have been on the run from a fairy-tale.' Romana asks 'What are you?' and the Doctor tells her off for her poor contact etiquette.
Adric is upset when Romana suggests she and the Doctor might go different ways: he doesn't like the idea of his new 'family' breaking up. K9's quote from the King's Regulations (Army) is not included in this scene.
Aldo and Royce (the comedy proletarians) came with the ship: Rorvik can't get rid of them because only they know where the main fuses are.
Rorvik has a directorial concern for image: he makes sure he looks like a captain before the TARDIS door opens, and he's constantly disappointed by his crew, who won't cheer or understand his crisp hatchway commands. And when he's threatening the Doctor at the mirror, he looks towards the crew, hoping they're looking trigger-happy, but they're more interested in their lunch.
Romana describes Biroc as an ectomorph, not a mesomorph. When she and Rorvik arrive at the ship, Aldo and Royce are busy trying to arrange a tarpaulin over the navigation seat to conceal it. The power level Romana gets subjected to hasn't been used since they punished Biroc's predecessor for trying to dive the ship into a sun. (It killed him).
During the Gundan's recital, the Doctor does not draw a distinction between the worlds the masters plundered, and N-Space.
Romana's out-of-phase trip with Lazlo is nicely described in terms of her temporary ability to share his time-sense. They have quite a long conversation in the gateway.
The gardens beyond the gateway contain the same areas - fountains, lawns, groves - repeated endlessly at different stages of deterioration. The Doctor isn't led from there to the banquet, he finds his own way. And during the table talk, he doesn't spill his wine.
Rorvik and his men try to dig round one of the mirrors, and discover that it continues underneath the stones. In the subsequent exchange with the Doctor, pickles aren't mentioned specifically, just food. 'The only substance dense enough to pin down a dream,' he thinks as he holds the dwarf-star alloy manacle.
Rorvik calls Adric a 'poisonous child' when he appears on the MZ. Back in the TARDIS, there's no suggestion that the collapse of the void could flip them back into N-Space. Romana's tongue-twisting line about the backlash is made easier.
After the return to the privateer, Rorvik strides along the bridge 'just as he'd seen the captain do in a 3V about pirates.' He says that the backblast could 'blow us into scrambled Thark's eggs' - an unusual misstep this, in my opinion; the privateer crew are menacing because they closely resemble contemporary people, and having them refer to fantastic stuff runs against this.
Rorvik doesn't stand on the Doctor's fingers - he tries to stamp on Romana's, but she dodges.
It's suggested that the Tharils come from a planet with an atmosphere containing nerve gas - I find it surprising then that they can breathe ordinary air. They leave the ship before the explosion, not after.
Adric actually dematerialises the TARDIS as instructed, agonising about abandoning the Doctor and Romana. They make it inside because the doors open in flight, just like in episode 1. The destruction of the gateway is seen at this point, and is very impressive, with the huge doors flying off like burning rafts, and the only thing left in the void being the circle of mirrors.
There's a moment of suspense when Biroc is approaching the mirror - a Gundan comes back through it, and he wonders if all the other Tharils have been massacred. But, the narrator tells us, it has been waiting to fulfil its command: 'kill the brutes who rule'. No longer able to decide whether that means the Tharils or the humans, it passes by and ignores him.
There's no 'noblest Romana' line: instead the Doctor says regretfully that it's not likely they'll meet again
The departure of the TARDIS takes place after all this is over, and is done at greater length: the Doctor now knows that the gateway was formed from the CVE, he can easily work out a course to N-Space, back on the other side of the mirrors. Except that it was established earlier, when the memory wafers were repaired by passing through the mirrors, that it's E-Space on the other side of the mirrors. That's why K9 has to go through them.
Perhaps he's puzzling over that too, because he doesn't say anything in the final scene. Lazlo and Romana do the talking: yes, she has regrets, but nothing will hold her back. The fountains in the gardens are running again.
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