Colour Mind of Evil/Missing Troughton?

[Bobby Clark (synthpopalooza)]

In regards to hoaxes:

I refuse to let myself get caught up in the emotionality of hoaxing. My attitude is, either it'll be true or it won't. If it's not, then Doctor Who fandom is no worse off then before the hoax happened. And if it's true, then we get a missing episode back!

I also think, the best thing to do if you do find a missing episode, is to definitely not post it onto the forum yet until you have contacted the RT, Ian Levine, or someone else trustworthy, and gotten the recovery procedures underway! Once that's done, then sure, get on here, and start posting "Hey, guess what?!! I found TENTH PLANET FOUR! How d'ya like that?"

I have to admit, my first instinct when I saw that picture of the Mind of Evil video tape was "yeah, it's a hoax" ... a damned good hoax, but a hoax nonetheless. Also, seeing thie bits about, "oh yeah, and my uncle has some troughtons stuck in the bottom of a box but I didn't get to see them" also smelled a bit fishy. However, I always try to reserve my judgement on the veracity of any claims, until they're proved wrong by Ian Levine, the RT, or other reliable sources.

One of these days, someone just MIGHT find a missing episode, and post it here first. Reserve judgement on any statements, until they are proved false. And don't let these hoaxers get under your skin, that's exactly what they want. Don't feed the trolls.

[Steven Sigel]

It was obvious from the get-go that it was a hoax.

1) It was posted on a brand new forum, not one one more well established like the RT forum

2) All his so-called evidence was trivial to fake - all you need is any old Quad tape and a label from the right era. And note that the ball point pen ink that he used looked recent too in the picture. Plus the who absurd story about digging it out from behind a bunch of furniture (while at the same time saying that the owner didn't want to sell it because it was valuable); and the mysterious comment about the troughton which was conveniently "burried too far under a pile to get at". Please. The guy was savvy enough (supposedly) to take pictures from all angles of the Videotape, but not manage to spend a few minutes digging out the print?

3) It's the standard "my neighbors cousin's uncle" type story.

As hoaxes go, this was a pretty standard one...

Think about this -- how many missing episodes have turned up after someone posted something like this to a forum -- none as far as I know... Bruce Grenville had no idea until he was told the "Lion" was missing. Francis Watson contacted the RT -- exactly what you would expect....

[Deleted]

synthpopalooza said:

In regards to hoaxes:
I refuse to let myself get caught up in the emotionality of hoaxing. My attitude is, either it'll be true or it won't. If it's not, then Doctor Who fandom is no worse off then before the hoax happened. And if it's true, then we get a missing episode back!

There is also a third (worse) scenario whereby the episode is proved to exist but no copy is returned to the archives!

[Greg H]

I understand what your saying Laurence, but the knowledge that something definitely does exist even in selfish private hands, gives hope that one day it will return and the public will get to see it at some stage in their lives. Its not a great scenario though for sure, but better than nothing. Im certain a few things have found their way into private collections one way or another.

[Deleted]

More than just a few, i'd wager.

[Greg H]

I would wager that you are right Laurence

Hopefully these grotesques will cough up one day; sooner rather than later.