“Survival” was the last serial of classic Who. From what I’ve read, it wasn’t written to be a series finale, but that kind of works for it. It’s an interesting, wild story and takes TARDIS teams to a new place, both physically and personally.
The Seventh Doctor and Ace have stopped by her home of Perivale, where—wouldn’t you know it?—there are strange goings-on. A spate of recent disappearances leads them to an interplanetary hunt, where a race of Cheetah People thirst for blood at the behest of a dying world.
Do the Cheetah People look a little goofy? Of course they do, but their story is an interesting one. It’s not just about what they look like or what they do, it’s about how they become what they are, and the forces that threaten to mold the Doctor and Ace (and the Master!) into the same kind of creature. This wrinkle takes the story to a much more compelling place than if it were simply about alien felines hunting across worlds.
As I said, the Master pops up here, which is fitting for the final serial. This time around, the Doctor’s best enemy isn’t planning any type of domination or destruction—he’s simply trying to escape the planet’s influence. I always like Master stories like that, where they’ve unintentionally thrown themselves into the fire and are now trying to get out.
It’s a pretty personal story for Ace. We return to her old neighborhood, and some of her old gang gets caught up in the mystery. As one of the more combat-oriented companions, you’d think she’d be well-positioned to deal with being hunted by a race of bipedal Cheetahs, but the Cheetahs’ world runs by different rules. As she and the Doctor learn, fighting back has larger implications here.
As I said, it seems that this serial was written without knowing it would be the last one of the original series, but I actually like that. I sometimes think series finales can do too much to wrap things up and put a capital-E Ending on everything. As a finale, “Survival” doesn’t have sky-high stakes. But it does take the Doctor and Ace somewhere new, makes both of them confront something inside themselves, and brings in one of the Doctor’s longest-running foes. And instead of dwelling on itself as an ending, the last episode closes on our heroes departing for their next adventure. It’s easy to imagine the Doctor and Ace continuing on—and they did, in novels and audiobooks and comics—because we say goodbye to them at a moment that’s clearly not the end of their story. I’m guessing the Doctor’s final speech was added in post-production when they realized the show wasn’t coming back, because it’s the one thing about the finale that has a wrap-up to it. But even as his words draw the story to a close, he and Ace are heading off toward the horizon, with limitless possibilities still ahead of them. And I love that.
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