Doctor Who/Recap/S17/E02 City of Death

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.
< Doctor Who‎ | Recap‎ | S17
"You're a beautiful woman...probably."
—The Doctor, failing to respond to the Countess as planned

The Doctor and Romana II find themselves in Paris, investigating a fracture in time, when they find themselves face to face with not one but six copies of the Mona Lisa. All of which appear to be authentic. Oh, and the original's still hanging in the Louvre. Hmmm...

The six Mona Lisas (Monas Lisa? Monae Lisae?) are all the property of one Count Scarlioni, who (as if all the Monas weren't enough) has a scanner for alien life, cleverly disguised as a bracelet on his wife's wrist. Now the Doctor's interest is thoroughly piqued.

Turns out that Count Scarlioni is—surprise!--actually an alien: Scaroth, last of the warlike Jagaroth. He's been kicking around on Earth since his spaceship crashed some four hundred million years ago. All six paintings are original Mona Lisas, all painted by Leonardo da Vinci in the sixteenth century. Scarlioni intends to steal the one in the Louvre and then carefully sell each of the Monae to a different private collection. The proceeds will fund Scarlioni's time travel to prevent the crash from ever occurring.

The Doctor doesn't especially mind... until he discovers that the crash of Scarlioni's spaceship was the "spark" that kicked off the development of life on Earth. Now they must work out how to defeat a being who's had four hundred million years to plan his escape.

As if all that weren't enough, John Cleese and Eleanor Bron have cameos.

For extra credit, spot the plot elements that Douglas Adams recycled into Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency.

Tropes used in City of Death include:
  • Accidental Art: John Cleese has a cameo in which he mistakes the TARDIS for a work of art.
  • Affably Evil: The Countess Scarlioni. Count Scarlioni projects this, but it's just a facade.
  • Ancient Astronauts: Scaroth.
  • Battle Butler: Hermann. "What a wonderful butler, he's so violent!"
  • Captain Obvious: Duggan: "That is a spaceship!"
  • Catholic School Girls Rule: Romana wearing a very St Trinian's style uniform. Lalla Ward, judging by interviews and the production notes, came up with the idea and had no concept it was a fetish.
  • Chekhov's Skill: Mainly mocked and taken the piss out of, but also played straight. Duggan's tendency to randomly punch people comes round useful as he knocks Scarlioni out one last time, landing the most important punch in history.
  • Cold-Blooded Torture: More like Cold Handed Torture - Tancredi orders the Doctor tortured using thumbscrews, however the Doctor relents before the torturer can even begin because the guy has cold hands.
  • Cool Guns: Everyone from Duggan to Hermann and the Count's Mooks use Walther P38 handguns. The Countess also has a nifty little pearl-handled revolver.
  • Deadpan Snarker: Romana's running commentary on Duggan's tendency to punch people and smash stuff.

Duggan: You can't make an omelette without breaking some eggs.
Romana: If you made an omelette, I'd expect to find a pile of broken crockery, a cooker in flames, and an unconscious chef.

Countess Scarlioni: I don't think he's as stupid as he seems.
Count Scarlioni: My dear, no one could be as stupid as he seems.

  • Omnicidal Maniac: Scaroth knows full well the consequences of his plan of trying to avert his ship from exploding, as in it would avert all indigenous life on Earth from ever existing, and he couldn't care less.
  • Padding: There's a few too many shots of the Doctor and Romana running around Paris; excused partly by the BBC wanting to get their money's worth out of the location shooting, and partly for Scenery Porn.
  • Punch Clock Villain: Captain Tancredi's soldier. "I'm paid to fight," he insists casually. He isn't particularly menacing and bears the Doctor no ill will despite being prepared to torture him on Tancredi's orders.
  • Reality Is Unrealistic: The real Mona Lisa is a good deal smaller than people assume, certainly smaller than it's portrayed here. Ah well, at least they didn't roll it up...
  • Real Life Writes the Plot: Probably inspired by an unconfirmed theory that the theft of the Mona Lisa in 1911 resulted in the conspirators selling six copies to American collectors, each convinced they had the real one.
  • Reverse the Polarity
  • Scenery Porn: Ahhh, Paris...
  • Shut Up, Kirk:

Doctor: Count, do you realise what would happen if you try to go back to a time before history began?
Scarlioni: Yes, yes I do. And I don't care one jot.

  • Stable Time Loop: Life on Earth would never have begun had the Doctor, Romana, and Duggan not been present back then to stop Scaroth.
  • Stealth Pun: In French, "City of Death" is "Cité de la Mort", which sounds almost exactly like "Cité de l'Amour" (City of Love, a nickname for Paris). Oooh la la!
  • Super Senses: The Doctor can identify Leonardo's brush-work ("It's as characteristic as a signature") and pigments with little more than a glance.
  • Surprisingly Happy Ending: In the end, almost all the copies of the Mona Lisa were destroyed, except for one that the Doctor wrote on the canvas in felt tip marker, "THIS IS A FAKE." Unlike Duggin, that doesn't bother the Doctor in the least since a copy of a painting by the original artist is not a fake and anyone who want would want to bother x-raying the painting to find his writing to determine its monetary value doesn't appreciate the real value of art anyway.
  • Swiss Cheese Security: The Louvre is surprisingly easy to get into after hours.
  • True Art Is Incomprehensible: Spoofed when some art enthusiasts mistake the TARDIS for a piece of modern art, and aren't even slightly thrown when it vanishes right before their eyes.

Female Art Critic: ... Exquisite. [Male Art Critic nods sagely]

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