"There's only us now."
Vicki says her goodbye to the Doctor offscreen and I don't have a problem with it.
The goodbye that Susan had was amazing and the writers realized that they weren't going to top it. They chose instead to save the emotional heart of the piece for the scene with Vicki and Troilus on the plains of Troy.
I have to give credit to Maureen O'Brien's acting. She emotes so well in this scene. She is in turns a teenager in love, a vulnerable orphan in a strange land, and a woman who embraces the future that has been ordained for her.
From what I'm led to believe, Maureen O'Brien vented about the way that Vicki was being handled. The new production team that was gearing up to take over thought that she wanted out and made the decision to write Vicki out after this serial. O'Brien was very much put out when she found out that she wasn't going to have a steady paycheck.
It also pissed William Hartnell off, leading to a bitter acrimony between him and the incoming production team.
The new companion, Katarina, isn't given the greatest intro in Who history. Vicki had two episodes dedicated to introducing her, Steven was the pivotal character in the episode where he debuted, Katarina gets a few lines and hangs her head at Cassandra.
She does have an interesting conceit. She believes that she is dead and that she is on the journey to the afterlife. It is something that a writer can work with, but considering the fact that Katarina is written out of the series part way through the next serial, I don't think that they were up to the challenge.
The comedic strokes give way to the gritty violence of the sacking of Troy. They don't focus too much on it, but there is a definite shift in tone. I think that it's needed to segue into the upcoming Dalek story and to give Vicki the dramatic backdrop to leave the series.
Next up: The Nightmare Begins
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