72.25%

As pilot episodes go An Unearthly Child is very good. The following three episodes, which combine to make the first adventure, are equally as good although I imagine most people will struggle to watch or find anything worthy of watching in a story essentailly about cave men. There will be those who would want, at the very least, some early 60s TV attempt at One Million Years BC - never mind the accuracy of dinosaurs sharing planet Earth with the human race. Putting aside such notions, it is easy to appreicate how good and enjoyable this first story is. It introduces the mysterious Doctor quite capably; there is a nice sense of wonder as Ian and Barbara emerge from the TARDIS to find themselves on ancient Earth rather than a junkyard in England 1963. Ian and Barbara are quite strong characters and they act as the viewer's entry into this strange world.

For some people, one of the hardest things to do is to judge a story both on its merits and in context. To judge this very first adventure on its merits: it is a simple story that is told well. It is about simple conflicts and minor intrigues: in short its a simplified yet identifiable variation on the world we know. Another concept that people tend not to grasp is that while the human world changes around us, the human mind changes little. There are those who like to overcomplicate the world we live in and yet they fail to see the basic simplicity of a lot of the conflicts that seem to threaten to tear our world apart. An Unearthly Child (or The Tribe of Gum or 100,000 BC) is a wonderful story: true there are no dizzying moral messages nor are there bursts of intense, profound dialogue. As I said, its stark simplicity works in every way and its hard to see how such a story could work today. There in lies the problem faced by anything more than 5 years old: appealing to the "now" audience. There are a great number of people who accuse anyone of liking black and white of "snobbery". For my money, snobbery is only exhibited by those who insist that only serials or films made now are relevant, even more so if its in colour and uses the latest techniques.