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Post by ianphillips on Jun 25, 2018 11:44:27 GMT
I hear on occasion that The Underwater Menace episode 3 was spared junking because of the fish people ballet. Are there any other episodes that were spared for similar reasons or is Menace 3 unique in that?
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Post by tombeveridge on Jun 25, 2018 16:55:35 GMT
I remember David Croft (producer and co-writer of Dad's Army) saying that so few of that series' episodes are missing is because of his direct intervention. Any time a junking request came to him, he denied it. Mind you, he was a very powerful figure at the BBC by that time but, given this story, producers (and directors?) might have had some say in the matter.
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Post by Richard Bignell on Jun 25, 2018 19:01:39 GMT
I remember David Croft (producer and co-writer of Dad's Army) saying that so few of that series' episodes are missing is because of his direct intervention. Any time a junking request came to him, he denied it. Mind you, he was a very powerful figure at the BBC by that time but, given this story, producers (and directors?) might have had some say in the matter. Requests to wipe the master transmission tapes always went to the department Organiser and it was on his authority that the wiping took place. They could consult with their respective producers if they chose to, but it wasn't compulsory. Barry Letts pretty much had no recollection of his Organiser ever asking him - not that he was actually bothered about that! No one would have asked them about the disposal of the old BBC Enterprises 16mm film prints. And the rumour about The Underwater Menace is just an old and untrue fan invention when people were trying to imagine reasons why certain episodes still existed. |
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Post by EJR Tairne on Jun 25, 2018 19:29:54 GMT
I remember David Croft (producer and co-writer of Dad's Army) saying that so few of that series' episodes are missing is because of his direct intervention. Any time a junking request came to him, he denied it. Mind you, he was a very powerful figure at the BBC by that time but, given this story, producers (and directors?) might have had some say in the matter. Also consider Blue Peter, which you would expect is far more an ephemeral thing than a scripted, performed drama. Yet, so far as I know, it's all still there. Because the producer made that effort. |
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Post by Jon Preddle on Jun 25, 2018 22:59:07 GMT
I hear on occasion that The Underwater Menace episode 3 was spared junking because of the fish people ballet. Are there any other episodes that were spared for similar reasons or is Menace 3 unique in that? If the BBC were going to deliberately retain an episode for its artistic merits, you'd think they'd keep the VT master tape, not a scratchy old 16mm print. Besides, the print of Underwater Menace ep 3 doesn't appear to have been held by the BBC in late 1976 when 'Whose Doctor Who' was in production, but it was at the film library in late 1977 when Ian Levine visited. Does this mean it had been handed back to the BBC in the interim? (Is this actually an early case of a missing episode being found and returned?) If that is the case, then that proves it can't have been retained for its artistic merits! |
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Post by Chris Wilkinson on Jun 26, 2018 2:27:34 GMT
I hear on occasion that The Underwater Menace episode 3 was spared junking because of the fish people ballet. Are there any other episodes that were spared for similar reasons or is Menace 3 unique in that? If the BBC were going to deliberately retain an episode for its artistic merits, you'd think they'd keep the VT master tape, not a scratchy old 16mm print. Besides, the print of Underwater Menace ep 3 doesn't appear to have been held by the BBC in late 1976 when 'Whose Doctor Who' was in production, but it was at the film library in late 1977 when Ian Levine visited. Does this mean it had been handed back to the BBC in the interim? (Is this actually an early case of a missing episode being found and returned?) If that is the case, then that proves it can't have been retained for its artistic merits! What specifically did the initial 1976 audit cover? Was it just the Doctor Who episodes held at the Film Library (as suggested by the dialogue), or were other locations included?
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Post by Jon Preddle on Jun 26, 2018 3:12:15 GMT
If the BBC were going to deliberately retain an episode for its artistic merits, you'd think they'd keep the VT master tape, not a scratchy old 16mm print. Besides, the print of Underwater Menace ep 3 doesn't appear to have been held by the BBC in late 1976 when 'Whose Doctor Who' was in production, but it was at the film library in late 1977 when Ian Levine visited. Does this mean it had been handed back to the BBC in the interim? (Is this actually an early case of a missing episode being found and returned?) If that is the case, then that proves it can't have been retained for its artistic merits! What specifically did the initial 1976 audit cover? Was it just the Doctor Who episodes held at the Film Library (as suggested by the dialogue), or were other locations included?
The production team of 'Whose Doctor Who' viewed selected 16mm prints at Enterprises (presumably Villiers House) and the Film Library. What was available to them were all the orphans that exist today, plus a couple of complete stories (like The Chase and Web Planet). The biggest differences are that both 'Time Meddler' and 'Galaxy 4' were still complete then, while the orphans 'Underwater Menace' 3 and 'Moonbase' 2 are not recorded as being there. They either were there but got missed off the list, or they were 'returned' to the BBC shortly afterwards. |
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Post by Chris Wilkinson on Jun 26, 2018 10:58:48 GMT
What specifically did the initial 1976 audit cover? Was it just the Doctor Who episodes held at the Film Library (as suggested by the dialogue), or were other locations included?
The production team of 'Whose Doctor Who' viewed selected 16mm prints at Enterprises (presumably Villiers House) and the Film Library. What was available to them were all the orphans that exist today, plus a couple of complete stories (like The Chase and Web Planet). The biggest differences are that both 'Time Meddler' and 'Galaxy 4' were still complete then, while the orphans 'Underwater Menace' 3 and 'Moonbase' 2 are not recorded as being there. They either were there but got missed off the list, or they were 'returned' to the BBC shortly afterwards. Could such orphan prints have come from Zambia, and assuming that 'bulk-recall' was in operation as it was with Australia in 1975, does this put a rough date on when the Zambian prints were returned (late 1976 to early 1977)? Referring to the 'New Bicycling Chains' on BroaDWcast where Zambia was the final country, this return could have comprised of The Highlanders through to The Faceless Ones, The Abominable Snowmen through to The Web of Fear, and The Seeds of Death through to The War Games - a Troughton bonanza!
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Post by Richard Marple on Jun 26, 2018 17:06:06 GMT
I remember David Croft (producer and co-writer of Dad's Army) saying that so few of that series' episodes are missing is because of his direct intervention. Any time a junking request came to him, he denied it. Mind you, he was a very powerful figure at the BBC by that time but, given this story, producers (and directors?) might have had some say in the matter. He managed to get some of his shows returned from Australia and/or New Zealand after being told they had been wiped, only to find them being shown when he was there on holiday! |
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Post by Jon Preddle on Jun 26, 2018 18:07:20 GMT
The production team of 'Whose Doctor Who' viewed selected 16mm prints at Enterprises (presumably Villiers House) and the Film Library. What was available to them were all the orphans that exist today, plus a couple of complete stories (like The Chase and Web Planet). The biggest differences are that both 'Time Meddler' and 'Galaxy 4' were still complete then, while the orphans 'Underwater Menace' 3 and 'Moonbase' 2 are not recorded as being there. They either were there but got missed off the list, or they were 'returned' to the BBC shortly afterwards. Could such orphan prints have come from Zambia, and assuming that 'bulk-recall' was in operation as it was with Australia in 1975, does this put a rough date on when the Zambian prints were returned (late 1976 to early 1977)? The season 4 and 5 ones could be from Zambia, yes. I'm sure the prints came back to the BBC soon after broadcast (so earlier than 1976). The films got junked, but .... I do have a pet theory (i.e. it's very silly!). Someone at the BBC saw their chance and lifted a couple. One was The Underwater Menace 3. They took it home and watched it. They thought it was bloody awful. A few days later, they 'smuggled' it back into the BBC, and secretly slipped it back on the shelf! |
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Post by Robert Lia on Jun 26, 2018 21:30:29 GMT
Well why risk get caught smuggle ling something into the BBC why not simply sell it at a car boot sale or throw it in the garbage. Ill bet some one simply borrowed it watched it and returned it. They might have even had a tacid permission to do so who knows especially if they were film cans be skipped an way
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Post by Chris Wilkinson on Jun 26, 2018 23:34:49 GMT
Could such orphan prints have come from Zambia, and assuming that 'bulk-recall' was in operation as it was with Australia in 1975, does this put a rough date on when the Zambian prints were returned (late 1976 to early 1977)? The season 4 and 5 ones could be from Zambia, yes. I'm sure the prints came back to the BBC soon after broadcast (so earlier than 1976). The films got junked, but .... I do have a pet theory (i.e. it's very silly!). Someone at the BBC saw their chance and lifted a couple. One was The Underwater Menace 3. They took it home and watched it. They thought it was bloody awful. A few days later, they 'smuggled' it back into the BBC, and secretly slipped it back on the shelf! I was hoping for an answer similar to that (the first part, that is), because the lack of certainty regarding the Season 6 serials is what gives me hope for The Space Pirates. We know from the tale of Ian Levine that he witnessed The Daleks bound up and ready to be junked; the film prints (both Arabic and English dubs) and the negatives, indicating that they were junked together (i.e. junking was not only film prints or only negatives, but both at the same time).
We know that The Seeds of Death negatives were in existence in 1978, but that Enterprises held no film prints (only the Film Library held #1, #4 and #6). We know that The Space Pirates had its negatives junked by 1976, and that Enterprises retained no film prints. We know that The War Games had prints of various episodes at both Enterprises and the Film Library between 1976 and 1977, and that a complete set of negatives and film prints were sent to the BFI in 1978. The Seeds of Death and The War Games currently exist in their entirety today, The Space Pirates does not. Similarly, clips of The Seeds of Death featured in Whose Doctor Who, whereas clips of The Space Pirates did not.
Considering that episodes were sourced from various places for use in Whose Doctor Who, could it be that prints were recalled from overseas especially for the making of the programme? Is that why we have The Seeds of Death, but not The Space Pirates?
Is it possible that The Space Pirates prints were literally pulled from the junk pile to be sent to Zambia, leaving the negatives behind to be destroyed? Does the destruction of the negatives indicate that Enterprises was assured no new prints needed to be struck from them, further implying that the prints were in their hands and inspected for quality before being sent off?
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Post by Richard Bignell on Jun 26, 2018 23:48:29 GMT
We know from the tale of Ian Levine that he witnessed The Daleks bound up and ready to be junked; the film prints (both Arabic and English dubs) and the negatives, indicating that they were junked together (i.e. junking was not only film prints or only negatives, but both at the same time). That's the story he tells, yes. Whether that's entirely 100% accurate is up for debate. They were only sourced from within the BBC in London - i.e. the Film Library or Enterprises. They 100% didn't come from anywhere else. The production file shows us that. They destroyed the negatives once their alloted sales window expired. If they chose not to renew that, then there was no point keeping the negatives as they could no longer do anything with them as they just took up valuable space. |
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Post by Chris Wilkinson on Jun 27, 2018 1:34:50 GMT
We know from the tale of Ian Levine that he witnessed The Daleks bound up and ready to be junked; the film prints (both Arabic and English dubs) and the negatives, indicating that they were junked together (i.e. junking was not only film prints or only negatives, but both at the same time). That's the story he tells, yes. Whether that's entirely 100% accurate is up for debate. They were only sourced from within the BBC in London - i.e. the Film Library or Enterprises. They 100% didn't come from anywhere else. The production file shows us that. They destroyed the negatives once their alloted sales window expired. If they chose not to renew that, then there was no point keeping the negatives as they could no longer do anything with them as they just took up valuable space. Ok. So why did the negatives exist for both The Seeds of Death and The War Games but not The Space Pirates in 1976? I can understand that they didn't anticipate or were not contractually obliged to make any further sales beyond Zambia, and considering that Zambia was pushing the two-year screening rights limitation to the max, the negatives for The Space Pirates would have been destroyed circa 1974. Why was the same not true for the other two serials, especially when nothing older than seven years could be sold or broadcast?
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Post by Sue Butcher on Jun 27, 2018 2:33:35 GMT
Was it anything to do with New Zealand not buying Space Pirates in 1969?
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