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Post by ethanmuse93 on Oct 19, 2018 14:46:19 GMT
Last night I noticed something a little odd that those of you in the UK will probably not have access to. I was browsing the Classic Who section on BritBox last night and noticed something. Now don’t get me wrong, I think this is most likely nothing significant at all, but as someone who automatically proofreads everything without realizing it I tend to notice little details. And while it’s probably nothing I still found it interesting. I’m probably not the first person to notice this but I haven’t read any other comments on it elsewhere so I thought I might point it out here just for the heck of it.
As I was browsing through the First and Second Doctor titles something caught my eye. BritBox lists every single televised story for every single classic Doctor, including the MEs. For complete stories you can click on each individual episode to watch it but most incomplete stories (even those completed by animation like Reign of Terror, Ice Warriors, and The Tenth Planet) are not posted for viewing. As I went through the lists of First and Second Doctor titles I noticed that all of the ME titles were listed as “unavailable” except for two of them. For some reason they had Mission to the Unknown and Fury From the Deep listed as “missing” instead of “unavailable.” Reign of Terror, Ice Warriors, Tenth Planet, and Moonbase are all available since their missing episodes were restored via animation, yet they are unavailable for viewing on BritBox for some unknown reason and are listed as such.
I have known enough conspiracy theorists over the years to know a little about how they think (and I’m being generous with that word) even though I think they’re nuts. I am not suggesting this for one minute, and I think that there’s nothing to it other than coincidence or poor editing on the part of the webmaster, but I understand their thinking enough to realize that if they saw this they would say that the BBC, via BritBox, is confirming the Omnirumour by subtly hiding in plain sight the fact that everything but Mission and Fury has been recovered. That would mean 90 episodes found and 7 still missing. Which is a shame, really, as I
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Post by charles drummel on Oct 19, 2018 15:01:34 GMT
You're not the first person to notice that, and it's been that way since Britbox opened. Missing vs unavailable is surely just a plain old inconsistency.
They've decided not to show incomplete serials. And they seem to not have the rights to a number of the animations. The exceptions to this are Power of the Daleks (which was new at the time Britbox rolled around, and was surely made with streaming rights in mind as it's available on every service), and Invasion. Not sure why Invasion is present - if the contracts were different earlier on, or it has to do with its original budget coming from BBC website funding IIRC.
At one point, they planned to make missing serials available via producing new reconstructions. John Kelly made one for the Wheel in Space, but they never went on to produce more. That recon has clean, clear telesnap scans, and restored audio. They also, with permission, used still images of Loose Cannon's CGI. But the project was not budgeted to include moving video, and it thus lacks the surviving censor or cliffhanger footage, as well as the full motion CGI by Loose Cannon.
It's a pretty impressive streaming catalogue, but it's not perfect. The non-Nation Dalek stories are also "Unavailable", as is The Five Doctors (supposedly due to the presence of a Dalek).
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Post by ethanmuse93 on Oct 19, 2018 15:24:55 GMT
Thanks for the explanation. I figured it was just an editorial mistake but I know people who would make a huge deal out of it.
And you explained something else I’ve been curious about. I’ve been wondering why none of the Dalek stories from the 80s were there, so thank-you for clarifying that for me.
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Post by Scot Ferre on Oct 19, 2018 16:15:14 GMT
Yeah, what Charles said. I’ve been a subscriber to BritBox since its launch. Those two stories were like that since then. Almost certainly a management thingy. Unavailable and missing are synonymous to them.
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Post by ethanmuse93 on Oct 20, 2018 0:28:30 GMT
It would be nice if it were true, except that I’d be happy for them to find Fury From the Deep and lose The Web Planet instead. But it’s obviously not true.
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Post by michaeltetzlaff on Oct 25, 2018 17:49:09 GMT
Thanks for the explanation. I figured it was just an editorial mistake but I know people who would make a huge deal out of it. And you explained something else I’ve been curious about. I’ve been wondering why none of the Dalek stories from the 80s were there, so thank-you for clarifying that for me. All of the unavailable Dalek stories (apart from Master Plan and Evil, obviously) are supposed to be made available on October 31, in just under a week, according to a recent update I got from BritBox. |
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Post by charles drummel on Oct 25, 2018 18:34:01 GMT
Thanks for the explanation. I figured it was just an editorial mistake but I know people who would make a huge deal out of it. And you explained something else I’ve been curious about. I’ve been wondering why none of the Dalek stories from the 80s were there, so thank-you for clarifying that for me. All of the unavailable Dalek stories (apart from Master Plan and Evil, obviously) are supposed to be made available on October 31, in just under a week, according to a recent update I got from BritBox. I'm glad they've worked out that issue. Those stories tend to be left off other streaming packages as well (IIRC, one in Australia), so I hope it's a general change in some policy. Did they say if Five Doctors would be included? |
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Post by michaeltetzlaff on Oct 30, 2018 12:58:15 GMT
All of the unavailable Dalek stories (apart from Master Plan and Evil, obviously) are supposed to be made available on October 31, in just under a week, according to a recent update I got from BritBox. I'm glad they've worked out that issue. Those stories tend to be left off other streaming packages as well (IIRC, one in Australia), so I hope it's a general change in some policy. Did they say if Five Doctors would be included? Yes, I believe that The Five Doctors is supposed to be included as well. |
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Post by Nicholas Fitzpatrick on Oct 30, 2018 13:26:31 GMT
I'm glad they've worked out that issue. Those stories tend to be left off other streaming packages as well (IIRC, one in Australia), so I hope it's a general change in some policy. Did they say if Five Doctors would be included? Yes, I believe that The Five Doctors is supposed to be included as well. The report is that it includes The Five Doctors along with the 5 other Dalek serials that BritBox is missing (Day of the Daleks, Planet of the Daleks, Resurrection of the Daleks, Revelation of the Daleks, and Remembrance of the Daleks). doctorwhowatch.com/2018/10/25/doctor-who-britbox-exterminite/ |
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Post by Jaspal Cheema on Oct 30, 2018 14:55:03 GMT
None of the Dalek serials mentioned in that article are missing. |
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Post by charles drummel on Oct 30, 2018 14:57:34 GMT
None of the Dalek serials mentioned in that article are missing. They're all missing from Britbox. You might be misunderstanding. |
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Post by Nicholas Fitzpatrick on Oct 30, 2018 15:10:33 GMT
None of the Dalek serials mentioned in that article are missing. The article is about the six 1970s and 1980s serials, including the Five Doctors, that are missing from BritBox. I just checked, and all five of those 1970s and 1980s Dalek serials are still missing from BritBox. See www.britbox.com/Surely it was very clear from both the context and the article what was being discussed! |
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Post by Jaspal Cheema on Oct 30, 2018 17:18:41 GMT
None of the Dalek serials mentioned in that article are missing. The article is about the six 1970s and 1980s serials, including the Five Doctors, that are missing from BritBox. I just checked, and all five of those 1970s and 1980s Dalek serials are still missing from BritBox. See www.britbox.com/Surely it was very clear from both the context and the article what was being discussed! Sorry,I thought they were talking about the BBC Archives.I am thoroughly repentant... |
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