Article on Missing Dr Who episodes

[stephenconnett]

Don't know if this has been mentioned here, but this is an interesting take on the nature of missing Dr Who episodes

screenrant.com/how-doctor-whos-lost-episodes-are-secretly-good-for-the-show/amp/

[lousingh]

That is an interesting theory. I don't know what younger fans think. I know that episodes being missing is more annoying and does not add a mystique to the series.

[George D]

While we regretably often imagine missing stories as more unbelievable than they are. The finds that have been found (enemy of the world, web fear, tomb, evil 2, dmp 2 ct4 etc) still show themselves to be high quality dramas that we're fortunate to have.

[Richard Marple]

I've heard a few fans were let down when Tomb was recovered & didn't meet their expectations. Same with the video release of The Web Planet & repeat of The Daemons.

[John Wall]

Tomb is very good imho. Web Planet was far too ambitious for the technical capabilities and budget.

[tom rogers]

Aug 13, 2022 20:29:27 GMT John Wall said:

Tomb is very good imho. Web Planet was far too ambitious for the technical capabilities and budget.

Tomb is excellent and holds up beautifully on repeated viewings. Almost the perfect series, IMVVHO. 

I confess that I have a very large soft-spot for Web Planet. So atmospheric and weird, and very moving in places. I actually find the effects to be quite good, and effective, given the budget and technology available at the time. I just go with it and it never disappoints. 

“Zaaaaaaar-bi!”

[John Wall]

Early stories often benefited from relatively confined locations, a small number of sets meant that they had more money per set. Stories like Tenth Planet, Moonbase and Tomb have excellent sets - because there aren’t very many. The same thing can be seen later in, for example, Blakes 7 where they’d always use the Liberator sets which would be supplemented by some location filming and, maybe, one other major set.

[mattg]

Aug 13, 2022 12:01:25 GMT Richard Marple said:

I've heard a few fans were let down when Tomb was recovered & didn't meet their expectations. Same with the video release of The Web Planet & repeat of The Daemons.

To my recollection at least the bulk of (relative) criticism Tomb’ received within fandom occurred many years after its celebrated recovery. It was almost as if it became ‘cool’ or hip to disparage the serial rather than acclaim it, especially once the hype had dissipated.

(Some) fans are funny like that - always keen to go against the grain and more importantly be seen to go against it.  

Coincidentally I rewatched Tomb’ the other day, still holds up for me at least.

[George D]

Tomb was, and still is, a great story.

The problem was when missing, people imagined it better than it was. Like sets that appear to go for miles. Any recovery takes time to remove our imagination and replace with the actual episodes

[Richard Marple]

Certainly the Cyber tomb sets are well realised, but the story is slightly let down by some slips in production standards, but not enough to spoil things.

I've noticed a few aspects of Dr Who have gone in & out of fashion in the time I've been a fan.

[John Wall]

It’s worth noting that most TV was intended to be seen only once - repeats were very rare. In the 60s I think the only repeats were the first episode and Evil. In fact some foreign viewers could potentially see things more often than Brits!

Tomb only really has four main sets: the control room, the tombs themselves, the testing room and the regeneration room. They had to get every episode recorded in an hour and a half with no post production. No, it’s not perfect but I always find it a tight and enjoyable story - four parters were relatively rare at that time. It wouldn’t be made the same way nowadays but it’s probably at least a 90% show imho, possibly 95%.