My name is Adrian and I am a Doctor Who fan. Not a die hard, quote-every-line-from-every-episode type, just someone who watches it regularly and enjoys it a lot. That said, there are probably more episodes of the classic series that I haven't seen than I have. So now, in its 50th anniversary year, I've decided that it's time to make amends.
My first clear memory of seeing Doctor Who was the final episode of “Planet of The Spiders” when it was first broadcast in 1974 when I was about four. It was the episode where Jon Pertwees' third Doctor regenerates into Tom Bakers' fourth. Despite finding it scary I thoroughly enjoyed it.
I continued to enjoy many of the Tom Baker stories, despite not really getting on with K9, but in those pre-iPlayer, pre-DVD and even pre-VHS days it was hard to keep up with any tv series in a household with one TV set and no other like-minded viewers. When Peter Davisons fifth Doctor arrived in 1982 the schedules became even more difficult with the regular Saturday slot switching to twice weekly and while I watched what I could it became more and more frustrating to catch only parts of a story and miss the cliffhanger resolutions.
I saw only a odd bits of Colin Bakers portrayal of the sixth Doctor and, honestly, what I did see I didn't really enjoy. By the time Sylvester McCoy appeared as the seventh Doctor I was missing more episodes than I caught but still found much to enjoy. When Doctor Who ended in 1989 I was more than a little sad to see it go.
Life went on though and now and then I’d catch a short run of repeats on BBC 2, perhaps a story from each of the seven. Occasionally you’d get a Doctor Who night on BBC2 with documentaries - some light-hearted fluff, some excellent - but despite frequent rumours of the series returning it wasn't until 1996 that the Doctor returned in the form of Paul McGanns' eighth Doctor in a TV movie.
I remember really looking forward to this movie and wondering how some serious financial backing would change the show. I thoroughly enjoyed it right from the start and appreciated the fact that it wasn't a reboot, it was a continuation, even to the point it had Sylvester McCoy reprise the role of the seventh Doctor before his unexpectedly violent ‘death’ and regeneration. Also it was a little more adult in tone and I was glad of that, I’d wanted the show to grow up with me. I was very dissapointed that a series didn't follow.
It was almost a decade later before Russell T Davies brought the Doctor back to the screen in the form of Christoper Ecclestons' ninth Doctor. I awaited it with baited breath as a Saturday early evening time slot didn’t exactly indicate it was going down the darker adult route. First impressions were great, but then we had a belching wheely bin which really put me off. In the end I did enjoy it, quite a lot, and by the time I’d watched “Dalek” five weeks later I was hooked again and have watched every new episode since and enjoyed the vast majority of them.
Fortunately the series proved to be a big hit despite the fact that almost as soon as it was back it was announced Eccleston was leaving the role after just one season. David Tennant and Matt Smith followed as the tenth and eleventh Doctors and just recently Smith has announced he will be leaving at the end of 2013 and we currently await the announcement of the Twelfth.
For some time now I've been contemplating watching the entire run of Doctor Who from it's very first epsiode broadcast on 23rd November 1963 to the very latest and, this being its 50th anniversary year, it seemed like a good time to start, although I’ve no idea quite how long this will take me.
Most of the first two Doctors stories will be completely new to me while I have seen many of the third Doctors stories over the years. The fourth Doctor, my Doctor, I am quite familiar with although I haven’t seen a good chunk of those stories for many years now. For the fifth to eighth Doctor I have seen most of the episodes but certainly there are gaps in the stories and I look forward to re-evaluate Colin Bakers Doctor specifically. Regarding everything since “Rose” in 2005 I’ve seen in its entirety.
The series had continued to live on throughout its off-air years in the form of books and audio releases but I haven’t yet delved into those areas much which is why my particular catch-up will only be focusing on the TV show itself.
But, of course, even that isn’t going to be quite as straightforward as it should!
During the 1960s and 1970s the BBC regularly wiped or ‘junked’ programmes either so they could reuse the tapes or save on storage space. Doctor Who was merely one of the many programmes affected. Miraculously many of those missing episodes have now been rediscovered, either from copies sold to other countries or from tapes or film reels which had found their way into private collections.
Rumours regularly surface regarding missing episodes having been unearthed but, as it stands today, there are still 106 episodes missing from the 253 episodes produced in the first six years of the show. There are 27 incomplete stories, ten of which are missing all of their episodes.
All is not quite lost though. Full length audio recordings for all 106 missing episodes do still exist. It may have been before the dawn of the home video recorder but fans still wanted the opportunity to revisit episodes of the series so took to making off air audio recordings onto tape. With multiple recordings of each episode available the BBC were able to combine and remaster them to create each audio track.They have since been released on CD along with newly recorded linking narration, usually by an actor from the relevant serial, as “The Lost TV Episodes Collections” in five CD boxsets.
Many of the recovered or still existing single episodes along with surviving clips from the missing episodes have been released on DVD, primarily on the 2004 “Lost In Time” box set. Some episodes have been recreated using a combination of the existing audio and pictures taken during the filming (known as tele-snaps and used for marketing, promotion or as a production record of the show) along with any surviving clips. Some serials have had missing episodes animated such as “The Invasion” which was missing two of its six episodes.
As of 2013 the budget allocated for each DVD release allows for only two animated episodes which rules out stories such as “The Daleks Master Plan” which is missing nine of its twelve episodes. There are also various fan created reconstructions of the missing episodes which are generally tolerated by the BBC as long as they are not sold for profit.
“The Five Doctors” was the first story to be released on DVD in November 1999 and September 2013 will mark the final complete serial release with “Terror of The Zygons” although further releases have already been announced for serials requiring animation of missing episodes such as “The Moonbase” due in October.
So, having assembled an almost complete collection of DVD’s over many years and having recently bought the “Lost TV Episodes Collections” on CD, I think I’m finally ready to get started and to travel back fifty years in time to where it all started.
I can’t wait …
Adrian
No comments:
Post a Comment