Pete Messum Reviews...

It was very difficult not to be excited for Legend of the Sea Devils . Not only did it mark the first time since 1984 that the aquatic foes had appeared in the series, but only their third story since their debut fifty years ago, despite being one of the most iconic Doctor Who monsters ever. The return of the Sea Devils has been on fans' wishlists for years, even after the horrific redesign of the Silurians for The Hungry Earth , so hopes were high for this 2022 Easter special. My expectations had been tempered somewhat prior to broadcast, not helped by a general lack of promotion for the special, yet even so I find myself thoroughly disappointed. I'd recently discovered rumours that Legend of the Sea Devils had been a turbulent production for the Doctor Who team, scheduled just after a last-minute New Year's Special that had been written in around a week by showrunner Chris Chibnall (after writing/co-writing six scripts consecutively, all drastic reworkings of an exist

The shot of the Sea Devils rising from the sea became an instantly iconic image in the minds of a whole generation of children in 1972. As someone born nearly three decades later, my first impression of the Doctor Who's aquatic foes was a photograph on the front cover of the Destiny of the Doctors computer game: a strange tortoise-like creature wielding what appeared to be a mechanical eye. I'd no doubt seen odd shots as part of monster montages on Doctor Who Confidential , but about a decade ago, I finally watched all six episodes of The Sea Devils for the first time ever. Malcolm Hulke 's scripts for The Sea Devils are sequels to not one but two stories: firstly as a successor to his own Doctor Who and the Silurians , a tale of prehistoric lizard creatures being reawakened millions of years into their future to find that mankind has taken over their planet; secondly as a follow-on from The Daemons , the finale to the preceding "Master season" that introduced