Having watched "The Key To Time" recently--I agree. I found "The Ribos Operation" a chore as well. Although I enjoyed "The Power of Kroll" 20 years ago, I find it weak now too. "The Pirate Planet" is an all-time favorite, and "The Stones of Blood" was solid. I've been watching Tom Baker in order for months now- the Phillip Hinchcliffe Era was consistently great. I've just given up on Season 18. I absolutely hate the changes John Nathan Turner made to the program. JNT took away everything I enjoyed about show away. Season 18 is so bland to me. Tom Baker seems completely disinterested- he barely looks at other actors. The constant destruction to K9 is juvenile. OK, JNT- we get it. You don't like K9. Adric. I only have "Keeper of the Traken" & "Logopolis" to go but I had to stop. Playing Peter Capaldi's Season 8 now.
Outside of the fans there were few who liked K9 the various props were always breaking down, even Jon Pertwee didn't like him. Tom Baker loved working with John Leeson, but K9 was always a problem on the show. And it was JNT who produced the K9 And Company pilot adding Sarah Jane as an afterthought, so I do think that getting rid of K9 was for the good of the show not her personal perferences.
Well, after a long break I struggled through the last half of The Androids of Tara. I've seen worse Classic Who, but this was still pretty bad. I think that I'm going to have to take a LONG break before I can stomach any more of the Key to Time season. Tom Baker's era really has started going downhill fast at this point.
Watched "Terror of the Zygons" last night, along with it's multitude of extras, and was pleasantly surprised at how good it was. SO nice to see the late Nicholas Courtney and Elisabeth Sladen in their prime. Anybody know why Netflix waited so long to acquire it?
I assume there's a toggle on the Randomizer that lets them switch it off. Supposed to watch the rest of "The Daemons" today, but weather and my antenna put the nix on that. Luckily I saw it a few months back.
Yup. When I was young I started on Tom Baker. The Brain of Morbius is the earliest episode I can specifically remember watching--around 8 years old, school would get out and I'd frantically pedal home on my Evel Knievel Huffy bike to switch on PBS. In high school they got the classic episodes too. They started showing them as "movies" on Friday nights. I don't remember if they showed an early Doctor and then a current one, if they alternated week to week, or what, or if they were caught up on Davison so they started in on the old episodes. Then I went to college in a town that didn't show Who, so I missed a lot of Colin Baker and all of McCoy. So I'm working my way through the whole series on weeknights, but once they get past "The Horror of Fang Rock" on Saturdays, I'll probably take a break until they get into Colin Baker (or at least Peter Davison). Yep, it's funny, as a kid, I loved JNT, because he brought the production values on the monsters and sets and such up so much, but the costumes he'd put the Doctor in and other production choices were so god-awful. Well, gotta go. Things to do.
It all varies depending on age, really. I started watching in late Pertwee (UK), got really hooked in early Tom, stayed the same for Williams-era Tom, ABSOLUTELTY HATED the first few weeks of Tom's last season.. then came round and saw season 18 as a breath of fresh air. In later years... really disappointed by Brain of Morbius when I saw it again, worst of the season sort-of-thing: maybe I should give it another chance now! Whereas I loved the hated Leisure Hive five years later, and so on... Season 18 remains a favourite. Similarly, some of the Blake's 7 episodes I least liked when I was 12 are my favourites as an adult (Shadow, Deathwatch... some others remain irredeemably awful, and maturity just lets you spot how weak the script was even then, when at the time you were distracted by the weak production... and if a 12 year-old is thinking that, the FX are bad!) It all comes around. The surprising thing is how many Who stories still hold up full-stop, and how many look far more impressive after 40/50 years than they did when they were 20 years old.
Well, the tapes arrived in the mail yesterday, I have the VCR set up and I am now half way through "The War Games". I am certainly enjoing it so far, and I'm generally not a fan of larger arcs. This one, however, is one is still going strong after five episodes without a lot of padding. Truth to tell, Troughton seems to be the exception for me as far as longer arcs are concerned. I also greatly enjoyed "The Web of Fear" and "The Enemy of the World", which are both longer arcs as well.
Agreed! You're wise to take a break-- I finally burned out after "Warrior's Gate" in watching the complete Tom Baker run. The inconsistency really began in "The Key To Time" series. Then- While I personally love the next Season 17--the camp value, and ad lib joking, with weaker scripts---the Tom Baker era was taken as far as it could go. It was coming off the rails, and at the same time never so entertaining for me. I'm finding that JNT reined things in, on Season 18- but there was no way Tom Baker could have-or should have-continued.
I personally recommend Colin Baker. I think his chemistry with Nicola Bryant was great. I think there's a real sincerity & passion in his performance to do a good job. I think JNT was out of control with his bad taste and decisions- and its fascinating train wreck television, from that perspective. The stories are generally poor, but for me it beats the bland boredom of the Davison era. This being "What is the last episode you watched?"- my answer is " Into The Dalek". My first reaction is- I didn't know the interior of Daleks had "floors". Peter Capaldi is excellent, in my opinion.
I had the good fortune to go to a Doctor Who convention in Minneapolis Minnesota with Colin Baker and Patrick Troughton as guests. They were both wonderful. And they played off each other very well. I've halfheartedly tried to find Colin Baker to write him a fan letter, of sorts. Because if there was anyone who toed the line and did what was expected of him--and got completely and utterly shafted for it, it was him. He wore the horrible, god-awful costume and played an unlikeable Doctor because that was what was expected of him and he was promised they'd develop the character and improve the costume later on. Then he got canned.
Does "Scream of the Shalka" count? We watched that last night and were quite impressed. Makes an interesting "alt universe" entry in the Doctor Who canon. It's fun to speculate on how things would be different now if the timing had been different between the BBCi effort and RTD's restart. We thought Richard E Grant was a delightful doctor. Sophie Okendo was also fine and the animation was better than I expected.
Its either an Elseworlds tale, or, if you want, a continuation to the Eighth Doctor comics/novels continuity(or -ies).
Maybe it was the Great Intelligence being present in the Doctor's timeline that would make "Shalka" canon Grant also played one of the Doctor's regenerations in the Curse of Fatal Death skit, although somewhat different than the Shalka version.
It is interesting, how my tastes have changes as I've aged. As a kid I much preferred Mary Tamm and Romana I. But I'm really enjoying Lala Ward. Tamm was kind of Robin Curtis Saavik, while Ward is more Kirstie Alley. She can do a great haughty Time Lady but she also plays nicely off Baker. Watching "Horns of the Nimon" tonight. At the end, the Doctor is repairing the TARDIS and tells it "You've still got a few more millennia in you, old girl." Romana thinks he's talking to her and thanks him. When he clarifies she does a cute little scowl before smiling at him just before the cut to credits. It's very nice.
Ward was actually married to Tom Baker for about a year or so (Although they both have done VA work for Big Finish, they reportedly haven't really spoken for years and record their parts seperately). Her current husband is famous biologist/Atheist Richard Dawkins (Who also has made a cameo as himself in the series). They were introduced by famous sci-fi comedy/writer Douglas Adams who, Who-wise-wrote Pirate Planet and the unaired Shada, as well as script editor for season 17.