'An Unearthly Child' (Ep 4 'The Firemaker')

Musings on Ep 4;

• Enjoyable bit of business from Billy H manipulating the bloodied stone reveal.
• The Doctor and Ian leading a stoning slash tribe expulsion is a bit of a shock.
• With the intensity of their first collective trip to an another (terrifying) place, our travellers are perhaps less seasoned and acclimatised to the terrors of travels with the Doctor, so in sheer panic the moral slippery slide is never far away.
• Nice bit of stuff with Ian saying, "no, he's our leader" and deferring to the Doctor.
• It's a complicated moment; is Ian realising they need the Doctor on side to get away?, or giving him the benefit of the doubt and hoping he'll rise to the occasion, adding some courage and morality to his obvious superior intelligence, to be the leader they need? I don't know, maybe both and more. Nice moment nonetheless.
• Hartnell looks like a long-in-the-tooth Buster Keaton during the close-up reaction shots to the film fight sequence between Kal and Za. The makeup department went to town on the black eye liner.
• The old man in the tribe is like a community theatre love child cross between Freddie Jaeger, Brian Blessed and Colin Baker as he chews his way through the line about how meat and fire used to bump uglies and every other line he has.
• The Doctor runs over the fallen Barbara in the forest after they escape using the fire skulls, what a f**k*r! Ian then helps her up.
• Maybe it was a "you're looking after Barbara, I'm looking after Susan" division as he knew Ian was behind and as they had divided 'duties' earlier, but still, it's utterly cold and cut-throat.
• Back in the TARDIS, the set is still looking great, all the flashing lights and bells and whistles work. I bet they never once changed a lightbulb when it blew, hence Troughton and Pertwee's run down, tatty console.
• The first shot of Skaro looks wonderful and I love the 'next week' set up and continuing adventure style of these early episodes.
• The modern series (and to a lesser extent later classic series even by the time of late Hartnell) picks up anywhere it likes and the ongoing story is swiss cheese. It's more difficult to truly invest in characters in these strange worlds when you have little sense of passing of time or intervening unseen adventures. The closeness you have and sense of wonderment and shared adventure with Ian & Barbara is never bettered IMHO.
• Overall, some great character set up for the first trip to another planet next time around. Episode 2 was probably the most tiresome, because it contained the bulk of the cavepeople "character development", but eps 3 and 4 move at a fair pace and there is much of worth to chew over with the regulars. All stylishly and assuredly pulled off by Waris Hussein.
• Next up: 'The Daleks' Ep 1: 'The Dead Planet'...