Shada - Again!

[The Four Doctor]

Apparently they cribbed some of Carey's lines from his Traken appearance.


Shame they didn't use audio from his role in Timelash:


Chronotis: "You may be wondering how i learnt of your treason."


Doctor: "Whaaat?"

 

[inflatabledalek]

It's very nicely done. The focus is very much not on making something aimed at the real hadcore fans (the ones who cheerfully watch recons of missing stories and wouldn't find the format shifts odd), there's a real attempt here to make something that will work for folk who just like Tom Baker and/or Douglas Adams. Most notably with a new scene being added to make the first transition to animation as smooth as possible.

Plus the editing on the live action footage has been tightened up considerably, not so anything's cut in terms of dialogue, but it zips along much more than previous releases or indeed what it would have been like had it gone out in 1979. Previously the scenes I'd found flat and badly performed are improved tenfold.

the animation itself, whilst clearly not Disney level, is still up a level from Power of the Daleks and does the job nicely, and all the reunited actors slip into their parts well. I think Christopher Neame may actually be even better than he was before. The decision not to recast K9 or Professor Chronotis does mean some cut scenes and rejigging, but if anything the reveal of the Professor's secret is handled better here than in the script where he just comes out with it at the worst possible moment (ironically the novelisation changes that moment for that very reason).

It's not perfect, Shada as both a production and a script never was (the various changes Adams made for the first Dirk Gently book--like having only one student sidekick instead of two--are all improvements). But for the first time the original works as a piece of entertainment rather than an historical curio.

And having Tom Baker film the final scene was a brilliant idea. You're so used to the switch between young Tom and drawn Tom him suddenly being old Tom doesn't take you out of the drama, and the discussion of what people will think of him in 200 years is perfect for a moment like that. It's tremendously heart warming. And the season 17 console room they cobbled together from the Experience version looked great!

 

[Qonundrum]

The bizarre thing is Ian is not some random basement dweller but a successful songwriter/composer/producer/manager who has to be fully aware of the legal realities of what he does.

There's a difference? Depends on your point of view.

 

[Pindar]

It's very nicely done.

I Watched it this weekend and really enjoyed it, the animation fitted in nicely and old Tom staring into the camera at the end felt like a nice link to the caretaker.

 

[Mr Awe]

I watched it a bit ago and I concur. Well done and enjoyable. The last time I had seen it was on the VHS with Tom's linking narration. It was much better this way! I enjoyed all the specials on the disc as well.

 

[Emperor-Tiberius]

Well, we haven't mentioned Ian Levine for a while, so here's a scene deleted from the leaked edit of his version of Shada, written by him apparently:

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Also, a quick review of the 2017 version: Pretty good. Granted, I always liked Shada but anyway. The animation was fluid and Tom Baker sounded great in it - clearly his time with Big Finish had prepared him for these scenes, which is awesome. I also appreciated their effort to limit K9's lines to Brierly, allowing him the story to be his exit, although I'd have used Leeson all the way. In comparison to Levine's version... Well, sadly I prefered Skagra there over this. And Lalla Ward seemed disinterested in the 2017 version, too. And if I thought the Shada prisoners were a tad much in Levine's edit, they were too sparse and insgnificant in the 2017 version (who are those villains, anyway?). They really missed an opportunity to use past villains, actual villains though, not just stock monsters, and that goes for both versions. And the Norton version probably didn't have access to the art designs Levine's had, resulting in some visible errors.

Still, I largely enjoyed it. I think an episodic edit can be made of it, with some stuff from the Levine version added back into this. And while the tag scene is controversial for most, I appreciate it for the opportunity to see Tom Baker as the Doctor one truly final time (although the lack of Romana is startling).

 

[The Nth Doctor]

Well, we haven't mentioned Ian Levine for a while

There's a reason for that.

 

[Emperor-Tiberius]

There's a reason for that.

True. Its too bad his surprising misogyny overshadows whatever qualities he might possess.

 

[publiusr]

Tom Baker filmed a new live-action scene.

http://www.radiotimes.com/news/tv/2...urth-doctor-in-surprise-new-doctor-who-scene/

Ah--I see the Tachyon Recreation Generator worked in The Leisure Hive.

When I first heard there was this lost episode called Shada...in my mind's eye, I thought Shada was the name of a shy character like Fantome:
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Fantome

---and that the doctor was trying to save him from exploters or something.

 

[starsuperion]

So here's my overall Question.. Which SHADA is now considered the canonized ver? Baker? McGann? Levine's ver? I prefer the comic look of the prison planetoid..I was never a fan of the McGann Symbol version.

 

[Emperor-Tiberius]

Obviously between the 2017 and McGann versions, since Levine's was only ever a spec.

 

[Christopher]

I'm not sure I'd call any version canonical, since they're all basically reconstructions after the fact of an unfinished/abandoned story. It's different from the animated reconstructions of other episodes, because those have the actual complete soundtracks of the originals and are recreating things that did exist as completed installments of the series at one point. "Shada" is more like a really extended equivalent of a DVD deleted scene, something that never made the original cut but has been pieced together as a bonus feature. (The fact that parts of "Shada" were repurposed for "The Five Doctors," and slightly altered to tie them into its narrative, makes it a bit hard to treat their original version as part of the same continuity. Did the Doctor just fall into the canal or was he swept away by a swirling black obelisk thingy? Although there are certainly worse continuity glitches in Doctor Who.)

Although I'd say that the version that comes closest would presumably be the 2017 reconstruction. I like the McGann version, but it's basically part of the audio line, albeit with optional animation. And it doesn't really quite fit McGann for me; it's a little too obvious at times that the Eighth Doctor is talking and acting indistinguishably from the Fourth Doctor, which I don't think is entirely in character.

 

[Emperor-Tiberius]

Adams clearly didn't write the Doctor in a loose way like Moffat says he does. He wrote for Tom Baker, and McGann doesn't even do one, quite wisely, but it doesn't come off right. And I genuinely don't like the rest of the recast, personally.

 

[The Wormhole]

You know what's great about being a Doctor Who fan? Not giving a shit about canon. I'm going to get back to that now.

 

[The Nth Doctor]

You know what's great about being a Doctor Who fan? Not giving a shit about canon. I'm going to get back to that now.

This one. Is it so hard to enjoy all of the stories without worrying whether or not something is canon or official?

I love all versions of Shada that I've seen and that's good enough.

(I'm still furious I have to wait until September for this animated Baker...)

 

[Turtletrekker]

I think that somehow, some way, all the different versions of Shada exist together in a big ball of wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey stuff. Besides, we know that a certain part of it is absolutely canon under any circumstances. The clip used in The Five Doctors. If that much of the Shada story is "true", then why not the rest of it?.

 

[Christopher]

Besides, we know that a certain part of it is absolutely canon under any circumstances. The clip used in The Five Doctors. If that much of the Shada story is "true", then why not the rest of it?.

Well, as I said, the "Five Doctors" version changes at least one important detail, namely the addition of the Time Scoop.

Besides, lots of productions use stock footage taken from other productions and repurpose it to represent something separate from its original form. For instance, "The Day of the Doctor" uses footage from various episodes to represent all the Doctors contacting the Gallifrey High Council and checking in, even though that's definitely not what the footage represented in the original context.

 

[Turtletrekker]

And the time scoop put them back right where it found them. The wibbly wobbly nature of the whole thing could easily thrown the 4th Doctor and Ramona's timelines out of sync so that they couldn't retain it, and they just kept doing what they were doing before the time scoop picked them up.

 

[Christopher]

And the time scoop put them back right where it found them. The wibbly wobbly nature of the whole thing could easily thrown the 4th Doctor and Ramona's timelines out of sync so that they couldn't retain it, and they just kept doing what they were doing before the time scoop picked them up.

Sure, you could interpret it that way. The point is just that the use of stock footage doesn't prove that the whole story happened, because plenty of stock footage is used to represent something separate from what it was originally made to represent.

 

[starsuperion]

I watched it a bit ago and I concur. Well done and enjoyable. The last time I had seen it was on the VHS with Tom's linking narration. It was much better this way! I enjoyed all the specials on the disc as well.

yea, but I miss the intro in the old doctor who museum. wish it started that way tho. was kinda nice.