This is the second story to be credited to Brian Hayles - and the first one that you could say he really wrote. That's because his previous contribution - The Celestial Toymaker - was fairly heavily rewritten first by Donald Tosh, and then by Gerry Davis. This wasn't Hayles' first historical story idea. He had previously offered a storyline called "Doctor Who and the Nazis" set during WWII, but at this time memories of the war were too painful, and too recent, in the minds of the viewing public for the BBC to consider it. (This was still the case a couple of years later, when Jimmy Perry and David Croft proposed a certain sit-com idea about the Home Guard, a TV vehicle intended for radio personality Jon Pertwee).
We're now at the tail end of the Historical stories, but technically these are now better described as Historical Romance stories, based more on literary works than actual events depicting real historical personalities.
Producer Innes Lloyd and Gerry Davis had already decided to phase out this type of story on joining the series, citing drops in audience numbers and audience appreciation figures for The Gunfighters, which they inherited, and for the recent The Massacre. Both wanted to concentrate on more hard sci-fi concepts - hence their employment of Kit Pedler as scientific adviser. They also knew that families mainly tuned in each week wanting to see monsters.
The Smugglers lacks sci-fi and monsters. It is based mainly on the Dr Syn novels of Russell Thorndike, and the novel Moonfleet, written by J Meade Falkner and first published in 1898. The latter had been filmed by Fritz Lang in 1955, whilst Dr Syn had reached the cinema courtesy of both Hammer (1962) and Disney (1963). Moonfleet had also formed the basis of the BBC TV series Smugglers Bay, made in 1964 and starring the soon to be new Doctor Patrick Troughton, and soon to be new companion Frazer Hines.
This is the first full story proper for Ben and Polly as companions of the Doctor, their first trip in the TARDIS.
They seem to take being in the TARDIS console room remarkably well. There is no apparent shock at their surroundings, despite having entered what looked like an ordinary Police Call Box. You have to wonder how they could have entered in the first place, if the TARDIS dematerialisation had already started. If it hadn't, why did the Doctor take off at all? They could hardly have come inside without him spotting them. It might simply be that his bluster about looking forward to getting the place to himself for a change is just that - bluster - and he secretly wants new company. He knows Ben reasonably well, having worked with him closely during the WOTAN business, but he would know Polly less well.
Minutes later, the TARDIS is on a beach by the sea. Again, Ben and Polly seem to accept this sudden relocation very much in their stride. No shock or amazement here either. They can readily accept that they are possibly in Cornwall a few minutes after being in London, but have a harder time accepting that they are now in the late 17th / early 18th Century - the exact date of this is never specified.
As mentioned last time, Ben was a right old misery guts about missing out on a trip to the Caribbean with his ship-mates and being stuck in barracks for six months, yet he's very insistent about getting back to London - despite knowing that the TARDIS offers instantaneous travel. He doesn't know about the dodgy steering yet.
Not a problem of the programme itself, but the Radio Times described the Squire as being the smuggler gang's secret leader prior to broadcast.
For a change, a member of the cast whose initials aren't WH fluffs a line. It's an important one at that - the riddle which is the key to the entire mystery of where pirate captain Avery's treasure is hidden. Hartnell actually gets the riddle right (twice), but this means that he doesn't repeat what he was earlier told by churchwarden Longfoot. Terence de Marney, who portrays Longfoot, gives the names in the riddle as "Smallwood, Ringwood, Gurney", when they should be "Ringwood, Smallbeer, Gurney".
Longfoot is killed by his one-time pirate accomplice Cherub - who then spends the next three episodes trying to find out what Longfoot told the Doctor. Why did Cherub rush to kill Longfoot in the first place, if he wanted to know the secret of the hidden treasure?
Captain Pike kills Jamaica for allowing his prisoners to escape, but doesn't punish Cherub with so much as a slap on the wrist for killing the only person who definitely knew the treasure's hiding place.
At one point Ben actually has to be reminded by Polly that they are a couple of hundred years back in time.
Another fluff by a member of the cast who isn't Hartnell comes later in the programme, as pirate Gaptooth calls his cutthroat colleague Daniel "Dar... David".
Hartnell himself has a couple of fluffs:
"You see that scanner? That's what I call a scanner, up there", and "Good heavens! What an imper... inspr... well, you are inspired!". When Pike invites him to sit down and talk together "like gentlemen", his response is "Thank you, no", when he's supposed to say yes.
Last, but by no means least, there isn't actually all that much smuggling going on here. It really ought to be called "The Pirates".
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