Paris Sucks

One Hundred and Seventh Entry in the Charles Daniels Unauthorized
Programme Guide O' Marriage

Serial 5H - Paris Sucks -

 The Doctor and Romana are wed on the planet Boogaloo.  The Boogalooians
are a wise and ancient culture who have long since isolated themselves
because although they are as peaceful and wise as any could hope to
be in this universe -- they are also incredibly thinned skinned and
burst into tears whenever anyone makes fun of their names -- which is
pretty much constantly.  In fact it is said that the entire planet cried
on the day of their wedding, not of joy, but because of the numerous
bad puns and obscene Delphon glances made by the Doctor during the
ceremony.   It is needless to say, that they were not welcome to
stay there for their honeymoon.  So the Doctor went down to Georgia..
umm Paris, which was a very bad idea indeed......

  4 million years ago lived Scarry, a lovable but stubborn little green
man.  He cruised for exotic locales in his giant spidership, for he
was a travelling salesman.  Scarry was a salesman for the JackingOff
Empire, an empire famous for fuck all.  The problem is the their home
planet was so remote from the galactic center that there were no other
civilizations readily available to inform them that the name JackingOff
wasn't an ideal name for their home world.  Still, many remote planets
have proven unfortunate in this way, such as the Earth.  "Earthing It"
being a term used across the galaxy for the disgusting act of...well,
you know what!   Anyway, Scarry wasn't the best pilot ever produced
by the JackingOff Empire, hence his name.  Scarry wasn't the brighest
bulb either because he should have known there would have been no call
for his brushes or steak knives on the ancient, barren, desert, rocky
Earth.  Almost any other salesman in the entire universe would have
passed it up, and perhaps scratched a short note out suggesting a
return visit a billion years down the road.  Scarry however took the
unique approach to the situation -- he crashed directly into it.
Still you must feel somewhat sorry for old Scarry, he was a pathetic
one eyed being with green skin, a wormy face, and entrusted only with
a meager warp 3 engine.  Scarry's puny spidership, The Ejaculation,
glowed, shaked, vibrated, then exploded in the sky into a shower of
sparks. This would have definitely killed almost anyone.  Scarry however,
isn't that lucky.

  Romana and the Doctor are on top the Eiffel Tower in 1979. The Doctor
causually mentions that this is "The only place in the universe where one
can relax entirely", however I speculate that he says this because he
has just gotten out of Parisian traffic!  To go anywhere after being
on the street or pavement in Paris, is to relax entirely!  The Doctor
further comments that Paris has a spirit all its own and compares it to a
good wine and hot dinner rolls.  It is at this point I begin to speculate
that the Doctor is merely trying to hype up his choice of honeymoon locale
OR that he is simply getting hungry.  In a cheap innenudo to their sexual
fulfillment, they forego the lift and instead fly away.
"Let's be ostentatious." coos the Doctor at his new wife.
It's all rather disgusting really.

 Meanwhile at a lovely chateau covered in gargoyle faces, thus tipping off
this is where the evil is happening, a Professor Kerensky complains of
money for the experiments he is haphazardly conducting. A Count named
Carlos Dracula gives him three million francs but the Professor tells
him, while this is good enough to pay for his lunches for awhile, he will
need more to keep the experiments going. It is then that Count Carlos
Dracula wonders if he's actually hired Orson Wells by mistake.  The Count
is further annoyed that one of his rare Guttenberg Bibles didn't fetch
enough
money.  So he informs his butler, Hermann, that they may have to sell the
Holy Grail as discreetly as possible. Hermann is skeptical about how
discreetly one can offer up a chalice of Christ in the 1979 Parisian
antique market, but looks into the possibility.

 In a cafe, the Doctor is reading the novelization of Star Wars. He flips
through it and reads it in about 10 seconds flat. The Doctor comments
about the book "exploiting a typical weakness of those Death Stars...I
wonder
why they make them that way?", and then tells Romana not to move, she
might ruin a work of art. A man nearby is drawing a picture of her. Romana
turns around quickly, causing the artist to get mad, get up, crumble up
the sketch and toss it on the ground.  Suddenly, the Doctor senses a
disturbance in the force, and Romana chides the Doctor for being so
influenced
by the bad science fiction he reads.  Romana picks up the sketch dropped by
the artist and is shocked to see it is a lewd drawing of herself.
The Doctor is further and deeply shocked, not only by it's wild
inappropriateness, but by it's fantastic realism and accuracy.  This
causes the Doctor to remember some high class porno he saw back in the
Renaissance and so he sets them off to the infamous Louvre.   The Doctor
calls the Louvre the greatest art gallery in the whole galaxy.
Romana suggests that the Academia Stolraus on Sirius 5 might be better,
but the Doctor quickly counters with the fact that you are absolutely not
allowed to take pictures in the Stolraus, whereas in the Lourve people take
so many pictures the flashes can make you go blind.  Romana then suggests
that the Solarium Panatica on Stricium might be slightly preferable, but
then the Doctor mentions that all novelty gift shops have been banned on
Stricium, but in the Louvre you can get any artwork of your choice
on a T-shirt, mug, or even lighted-up Christmas card with tinny classical
music.  Finally Romana insists that the Braxiatel Collection must
represent a superior gallery, to which the Doctor quickly and deftly
counters with holding his breath and stomping his feet until he turns blue
and she takes it all back.  Apparently this is how he wins many of their
debates.  All of this of course taking place in front of the infamous Mona
Lisa.   A school teacher is taking children to the Mona Lisa and asks the
Doctor, if he can start breathing and move along. The Doctor stumbles into
her, passes by others and then collapses onto a red bench and into rich
lady.
He sits on her lap and then falls off the bench.  This proves of deep
embarrassment to Romana, who finally relents in deep aggrivation,
"OKAY!  It's the best art gallery in the entire DAMNED UNIVERSE!! OKAY!?
Even if it's star attraction is some freakish lady without eyebrows!  Just
start breathing and act your age for once!"

  The Doctor is kicked out of the Louvre by the staff and angrily shouts
"It isn't like this is the first time you know!!  See if I care!"   Along
the sidewalks, a man named Dougal follows Romana and the Doctor.  The
Doctor and Romana realise this immediately because Dougal crashes over
some trash cans and generally trips and stumbles his way along his
stalking.  The Doctor causually mentions that he stole a bracelet from
the rich lady because a bit of kleptomania spices up one's day, and
wonders if the gun in his back is related to that.  The Doctor
decides to be diplomatic and return the bracelet to the fellows with the
guns.

  After this exchange Dougal tells Romana about the strange Count Carlos
Dracula. "Masterpieces thought lost for centuries, are all turning up in
this bloke's cellar! Sure, an original draft of Hamlet here, a Holy Grail
there, and I'd have no reason to be suspicious...but he recently sold a
Superman Number 1!  They must be very good fakes because they stand up to
every scientific test!"    Shortly after dropping this nice piece of
background, the trio are kidnapped at gunpoint to advance the plot.

 At the chateau we discover that the rich lady is in fact the wife of
Count Carlos Dracula!  The Countess smokes a cigarette and tells her
husband to PLEASE get his nice face on because they are having company soon.
It is here that we are given a touching scene of domestic bliss between a
gold digger and a green man with one eye and face reminiscent of moldly
spaghetti.  Truly one of the heart touching moments of Doctor Who.

 When the Doctor, Romana, and Dougal arrive at gunpoint the Draculas have
prepared a lovely set of party games, appetizers, and similiar party
diversions. However when the Countess SEES the Doctor her mood changes
completely.  She tells Romana that they once had an affair, long before
she met the Count.  Romana is deeply upset with this news, she angrily
asks the Doctor if they'd seen anyone else that day he'd had sex
with.  The Doctor causually replies "Well, Mona Lisa of course, but that
was in the 16th century, and that school teacher of course, but that was
in the 40s!  The waitress at the cafe, but that must have been ages ago.
Oh yes, and that artist chap!"   After a long and detailed conversation
it transpires that the Doctor has slept with absolutely everyone in Paris.
"Well, I have a time machine, and sometimes I get bored and
creative."  Offers the Doctor in way of explanation.

 Everyone is roundly upset with the Doctor - The Count for his wife,
Romana for everyone else in Paris, and Dougal for eight generations of his
family.  They are all now to be taken prisoner and led to the cellar by
their henchman/butler Hermann.   As he leads the way into the cellar,
Hermann reveals the entire masterplan.  This is a sad state of affairs
when the evil overlords entrust their ENTIRE Masterplan to one talkative
henchman, but hey, how else is Doctor Who going to save the world?  Anyway,
they want to steal the Mona Lisa and just by the way, the chateau was built
about 474 years ago and therefore makes it a contemporary of Leonardo Da
Vinci himself, what an odd useless bit of trivia, that MAY be of some
minimal interest.  Hermann further explains that they are going to sell a
whole bunch of Mona Lisas after the fact and that also in the cellar they
are building a machine that can manipulate anti-time, just as a hobby.

  Sitting the cellar the Doctor approaches the scientist, Kerensky, and
tells him that tinkering with time is a bad idea when you don't know what
you are doing.  The Doctor goes on to further say that HE DOES know what's
HE'S DOING and it's STILL a bad idea - as evidenced by the time sex he has
enjoyed with every single Parisian. While giving advice to Kerensky the
Doctor trips over a painting, which happens to be the Mona Lisa, he
immediately mentions this to Kerensky who replies wearily
"Oh yes!  This whole cellar is crawling with those damned Mona Lisas!  I
wish they would tidy this place up!  Where am I going to put my new Prime
Computers?!"

  The Doctor decides that he'd better talk to DaVinci about this in
person, so he makes his escape to the Denise Rene Art Gallery where the
TARDIS is parked. The Doctor arrives in Florence, Italy 1505 AD.   As
usual, Lenardo somehow got wind of his arrival, and not wanting to face
the aftermath of their doomed love affair, he runs away.  Dejected, the
Doctor enjoys some torture from a 16th century incarnation of Count
Dracula. The torture mostly consists of the Count bragging about his
greatness in history.

  "Can you imagine?  Selling the quarried rock from which the pyramids
  were built, selling the parchments on which the world was first mapped,
  being head PR behind the invention of first wheel, selling the first truly
  usable fire-making kit, and bringing up a whole race to the point where
they
  could buy enough brushes and steak knives to fund the saving of my own
race!
  I will be remembered as the great JackOff of all time!  I will be their
  ultimate Salesman!  I WILL BE EMPLOYEE OF THE EPOCH!"

During this cliche evil gloating, the Doctor makes a cliche easy escape.

   Meanwhile, back in the cheateau in modern times, Count Dracula explains
his situation to Romana  (It's even sadder when the MASTERMINDS can't
keep a masterplan to themselves!) -- he's been split into 12 different
parts via the warp control cabin. His parts have lead different but
connected lives in this planet's history.  In this time period he chose
the name Count Carlos Dracula to mislead people into thinking he was a
vampire. "I realised that IF I called myself Count Dracula..they'd all
suspect me to be a vampire, and the thought of me being an alien overlord,
would be the farthest things from their mind!  Brilliant, don't you
think?".  Scarry wants to go back to where his spidership was and stop
himself from crashing into the earth, and instead boogie on towards Mars
to see if they need any Ginsu knives.   And, as plot would necessiate, he
is now ready to go, this very instant -- and so, he does.

  The Doctor meets up with Romana and they head for the TARDIS.  The
TARDIS is inside of a small hotel in Torquay.  By the time they arrive the
owner has discovered the TARDIS inside of his dining room and has begun to
slap about the help, with insane screams -
"How did this Police Box get into my dining room Manuel?!"
"Que??"
"Policia telefone, no me gusta!"
"Que?"
"Oh god, if Sybil sees this moldly old thing in here I'm dead!"

   The hotel workers are astounded to see two hippies run into the Police
Box shortly before it quickly vaporises.  The Doctor and Romana follow
Scarry
back to Paris in 4 Million BC.  Using a telescope, the Doctor finds the
JackingOff ship--a vicious, callous, commerical race whom the universe
won't miss. While taking a brief walk around the Doctor falls into a
puddle of the sinus-like goo from which all life on Earth will spring.
The crash which caused Scarry to splinter into time also caused the birth of
the entire human race. So in a very real way Scarry had succeeded in
giving birth to the most capitalistic, enterprising race in the universe.
The Doctor remarks on the irony that Scarry can not see or appreciate this
species - "There would be no end to the useless knick-knacks and home
improvement devices he could pitch to them."

    Just then Scarry arrives....on the planet's surface, and NOT in space.
This was very bad planning and Scarry is helpless but to watch the
spidership crash into a mass of flame and radiation which ignites the
slurry soup.

    The time travellers return to modern times together and the Count
escapes in hopes that he will be invited as a returning villain.  The
Doctor makes way to immediately destroy the anti-time machinery, but
Romana stops him in the nick of time.  Romana doesn't want the Doctor to
destroy the machine before using it to go on a quest for her.....


Book(s)/Other Related - Doctor Who Paris Les Merde
                        Doctor Mysterio Mucho Scarry Temporola Boinky!
                        THE BEING THAT CAME FROM BEYOND TIME - to sell us
                        steak knives

Fluffs - Tom Baker seemed shagged out for most of this story

Fashion Victims - Aliens with green faces and white leisure suits signify
                  beyond all doubt that this IS 1979!

Goofs - 4 million years ago??!!!?!?!?!  The dinosaurs had been extinct
        for 61 million years before that!!  The timing here is just loopy.
        Also, the earth is supplied with a nice oxygen atmosphere before
        the existence of plant life.
        Oh, and why were they worried about the length of a journey
        to Torquay if they have a TIME MACHINE to travel in???

Technobabble - "ANTI-TIME!!  ANTI-TIME PROTONS!!  DISRUPTING...MY MIND!!!
                ROMANA!  ANTI-TIME PROTONS ARE DISRUPTING MY MIND!"
               "No Doctor, it's all that whiskey you've been drinking,
                remember?"

Links and References -
The Doctor mentions the Dustbins and Lavros couldn't show up to the
wedding, which he finds agreeable because he wanted a "dirty
wedding"...or did he say dirty weekend?  I wish my tape wasn't so warbly!

Untelevised Misadventures -
At some point the Doctor had sex with Leonardo and the model for the Mona
Lisa. Also at some point between this story and the Masque of Zorro the
Doctor does unsightly things to meat and vegetable products in Da Vinci's
broom closet. Also there is a segment of the Doctor's life where he used
the TARDIS' time travel capabilities to in someway sleep with every single
inhabitant of Paris. So basically there are eons worth of missing
adventures which I'm more than happy remain missing.


Groovy DVD Extras -
A release sadly devoid of any notable bonuses, with the exception of a 2
hour long commentary track, in which Tom Baker tries, and fails, to
explain his hair.

Dialogue Disasters -

Countess: [Speaking of the Doctor]  My dear, I don't think he's as stupid
                                    as he seems.
Count: Yes he is.

Count: I am Scarry. Me, together in one.
Doctor: I am giant!!  HOLY OUTLAW!  Altogether, you'll never be strong
        than me!
Count: What are you on about?!
Doctor: Oh I'm sorry, I thought you were quoting that song 'Legion', by
        Black Sabbath you know?  "I am standing alone, BUT I CAN ROCK YOU!!"
Count: No, no!  I was going into my own little meglomanical rant.
Doctor: Oh, please continue then.  I'm sorry.

Count:  The centuries that divide me shall be undone.
Doctor: I'm afraid I don't know that one...unless...was that a sound clip
        from Pink Floyd Echoes?
Count: What?
Doctor: Well it sounds very familiar..hmm.."The centuries than divide me
        shall be undone"..well that's not a lyric in Time I'm pretty sure.
        Still it sounds a lot like Pink Floyd.
Count: NO!!  I was going into yet another meglomanical rant!
Doctor: Oh I'm sorry!  It's just all your rants sound like lyrics from
        popular 70s British Rock bands!

Count: AND TO THINK I MADE *LOVE* TO YOU!
Doctor: Well, name me something that hasn't!  I'm a popular vintage.

Romana: Shall we take the lift or fly?
Doctor: Let's be ostentatious.
Romana: All right... let's take the lift, then.
Doctor: That would look silly for Time Lords...we'll fly.

The Angel of Death wanders onto the scene -

Death: YOUR TIME HAS COME!  You will travel with me on the river Styx.
Doctor: I'm sorry, I think your on the wrong set, this is Doctor Who you
        see.  We're filming.  And we're on a budget, so we won't be able to
go
        back and edit this out now.
Death: Oh I'm sorry, this set looks just like the one I'm suppose to be
       on.
Doctor: Yes, it's a grand illusion.
Death: I'll say, they look IDENTICAL!
Doctor: Deep inside they're all the same.

Dialogue Triumphs -

Dracula: I'm not sure if it will make sense to you, but whenever I come up
         with a really great masterplan.  I mean one I'm damn sure will
         work and give me world domination, I just like to run it by
         someone first.  To see if they will spot any loopholes
         that will be incredibly useful in stopping me.
Romana: And do you usually get good feedback?
Dracula: You know, that's the funny thing.  Usually they say they can't
         think of anything wrong with my plan.  So I go on along with it
         to the letter -- then at the LAST minute, believe it or not,
         they SUDDENLY come up with something!   Damn that's annoying.

Romana: Where's a pub around here?
Doctor: Are you talking philosophically or geographically?
Romana: Philosophically.
Doctor: Then there's one called the Voltaire on Avenue Ledru-Rollin!

Doctor: I suppose the best way to find out where you've come from is to
        find out where you're going and work backwards.  At least that's
        what I do after a night in the pub.



The fabulous last anti-time quest, which Romana insists on at the end of
the story ---
Romana: What are you doing Doctor?!
Doctor: I'm going to destroy it!  Destroy it all!  So Scarry can never use
        anti-time again.
Romana: Alright, but, before you do that.  I need you to use it for
        something.
Doctor: What??  Whatever for!?
Romana: This machine, it can undo time right?
Doctor: Yes, entirely.
Romana: Than Doctor....I need you to undo Paris.
Doctor: What?!
Romana: I want you to undefile the entire populace.
Doctor: Romana..wait, let me get this straight...you want me to...unscrew
        the world?
Romana: I insist Doctor!
Doctor: Do you know how LONG that would take???
Romana: Yes, now, please.  For me.
Doctor: Alright...but it won't be as fun this time around, believe me!

Dialogue Oddities -

(ORIGINAL SCRIPT - at the wedding)
The Doctor:  I do.

(ON SCREEN)
Tom Baker: I did.

Viewers' Quotes -

"And so the holy marriage of the time lords exposed the evil, dirty, kinky
past of sin and lust...Not enough exposure though, I wanted more direct
exposing.  I wanted SEE the evil, for only in facing it, can we conquer
it.  I'm in the mood for some pillage and conquest today I tell ya'!"
                                    - Father James O' Maley (1979)

"We, The JackingOff Empire, wish to relay to the human race, that any
attempt to destroy it entirely should not be seen as an invitation to
not buy our variety of special and helpful products."
                          - Official Diplomatic Department (4 Million BC)

"The opening sequence could hardly have been more effective.  I haven't
read much mention of this elsewhere, but it establishes a likeable, if
somewhat inept character.  I mean here's this poor green bastard with one
eye trying to make a living selling electric toothbrushes and a few odd
and ends, and he pilots spidership into an empty, inert Earth.  You gotta
feel for the jerk.  That's all I'm saying."    - Chris Drunk (1980)

"Sure this story had a cracking good storyline, brilliant
characterisations, a fantastic sense of humour, but all of them have
storylines, characterisations, and senses of humor...this one is special
because it had lots and lots of gratuitous violence!"
                                          - Manuel Danielson (1989)

Psychotic Nostalgia -
"Oh yeah, I'm supposed to be so impressed because this alien made all this
machinery to UNMAKE time in his basement!  Have you seen the stuff in
my basement??  Oh man!  It's neat and it's got spikes too!"

Tom Baker Speaks!
"They let me adlib on this one.  I always liked the ones where I was
allowed to ad lib.  I say, this is the one where I married a Doctor Who
Monster!  Still, I might be tempted to tell you about what I did to the
BBC's candy machine.  Maybe, if you passed me another pint and gave me a
sexy wink."                      - Tom Baker exclusive

Rumors & Facts -

  Paris Sucks is one of the very few Doctor Who serials not yet novelised,
due to the rate of 8 million pounds per page commanded by Adams and his
refusal to let anyone else tackle the story and his persisant refusal
to come back from the dead and finish it himself. However, Adams did
self-plagarize the whole damn thing in his 1987 novel Dirk Gently's
Holistic Detective Agency.   The history of this story follows -


  A script had come in called "The Gamble With Time", set in Las Vegas,
which starts with the story that the Doctor and Romana have settled down
as a married couple and the Doctor has gone into the business of rigging
gambling machines in order to keep them both rich as sin.   This goes well
until Count Dracula, last of the Vampires, shows up and steals the
Doctor's money in order to build a time machine which will transport him
to the beginning of the vampire race, allowing him to guide and alter the
history of his kind.  Unfortunately, the  producer was displeased with the
scripts, saying that "Vampires were simply too camp and crap to ever
appear in Doctor Who" and he was uneasy about including
material about gambling that featured the Doctor cheating at craps.

  The script would have gone largely ignored except for the fact that the
reliable writer they had all their hopes pinned on was busy writing for
a pilot about his own life called "I Live In My Own Apartment, And Not My
Neighbors Apartment.  Even Though His Apartment Is Just As Nice."
Deep in throes of disbelieving panic, the producer and script editor shut
themselves away for three days for some serious drinking.  It was during
this period that they turned to and completely rewrote The Gamble With
Time. The Curse Of Marriage, as it was now known, was an incredibly
similar adventure which differed in the details on every single level.

  The crew arrived to film in France from May 30th to April 3rd.
Unfortunately, and you really have to admire this, they totally
forgot that this meant May Day was going on full throttle in
France.  Every place they went to for two full days was closed up.  First,
the Denise Rene art gallery was not only closed but its owners
were completely unreachable. The director decided to continue taping
regardless.  Unfortunately, on the fourth take, Baker rattled the gallery
doors too violently, setting off a burglar alarm. With enough shots
already in the can, cast and crew hurried away to the next location,
leaving Nathan-Turner to be captured by the police and spend several days
in a French prison -- an experience he apparently did not disagree
with. Later that day, the director learned that his request to
carry out some filming at the Louvre had been turned down. With only a few
brief sequences needed, the director elected break into the museum to do
the filming anyway.

 Then, on the next day, cast and crew arrived at a cafe called the Cafe
Coquille, only to find that it, too, was closed for the holiday. When the
owner refused to open his doors, the cast was forced to break down the
door and begin shooting as fast as possible, apparently Mr. Baker
liberated various buns from the tyranny of the proprietor.

 It is not surprising that the Doctor Who team was never again invited to
shoot in France.