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Post by Mark Vanderlinde-Abernathy on Sept 20, 2012 21:47:45 GMT
By the way, Im actually enjoying this conversation a lot more than the general "leads" and "favorite episode" posts, its actually educational, thought provoking, and may lead to new information about the history of these prints. I think we're just bored. Leads us to wax philosophically over labels that we've had for 25 years.
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Post by Jon Preddle on Sept 20, 2012 21:53:37 GMT
Theory: Blue handwriting must've been added after episodes were separated at some point in its history. If the blue-pen writer figured out the can held Episode 1, he would've just put it back in the same can. Since that didn't happen, whomever blue-handwriter is didn't have ep 1's canister at the time. 1988 was when they were discovered and their importance realized. The blue pen says "2 prints" but that was never reported in 1988 or since. So maybe when they were pulled out of the cupboard the blue ink was on them. At some point between their return to the UK and their discovery in 1988 they were in an archive that contained a second print of Episode 5, but was missing the canister for Episode 1. Blue-writer at that point made his marks, and then either he or someone else pushed them to the back of the cupboard. Edit: Also, anything to be read in the fact that the blue marks were underlined, double underlined, or not underlined? Or is that just reading TOO much into this? My understanding of it is that it wasn't until the films were examined that it was discovered that what was labelled as "Ep2" was in fact "Ep1". If the labels on the cans when they were found already had EP TWO crossed out and OO1 written on why the surprise of it being a different episode? So, my thought is "EPI TWO" was crossed out and "OO1" notation written on when the films were discovered in 1988 to indicate that the contents were different. The other three cans were notated at the time as a matter of course.
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Post by Jon Preddle on Sept 20, 2012 21:57:35 GMT
By the way, Im actually enjoying this conversation a lot more than the general "leads" and "favorite episode" posts, its actually educational, thought provoking, and may lead to new information about the history of these prints. I think we're just bored. Leads us to wax philosophically over labels that we've had for 25 years. This is the first time these labels have been made public, and because we've seen them, quite a few new thoughts and ideas have arisen as to their origins, thoughts that might never have been brought up had the labels been kept locked away. How many other labels are there, and can we see them; we might spot something on them that's been overlooked!
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Post by Jon Preddle on Sept 20, 2012 22:03:26 GMT
But when the individual looked in the Fury of the Deep canister, the writer did not make a correction to say that it was not FotD6. That also suggests to me that the canister contained what it said at that time. Not necessarily. The FftD6 can contained another programme. After it was examined, it would have been placed into a new can, with a new label. The now empty FftD wasn't reused, so nothing was done to its label.
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Post by Mark Vanderlinde-Abernathy on Sept 20, 2012 22:15:15 GMT
I think we're just bored. Leads us to wax philosophically over labels that we've had for 25 years. This is the first time these labels have been made public, and because we've seen them, quite a few new thoughts and ideas have arisen as to their origins, thoughts that might never have been brought up had the labels been kept locked away. How many other labels are there, and can we see them; we might spot something on them that's been overlooked! Well, we have these five. The Moonbase and Marco Polo labels are easy to find on the web. (often used for hoaxing) Evil of the Daleks 2 can be found on wikipedia's webpage about missing episodes. Paul: You didn't happen to save any of the imagery from the Land of Fear or Web Planet eBay auctions? Steven: Do your episodes come with labels?
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Post by Jon Preddle on Sept 20, 2012 22:15:38 GMT
Another question I have for whomever is what vintage are the labels or what years they were generally used. If they are 60s 70s labels then its possible the writing is original. If they're 80s labels, then it means that Fury from the Deep 6 existed into the 1980s. The BBC labels with the crest seem to date back to the mid to early 1960s. The Marco Polo can, received in NZ in 1966, and The Moonbase ep 3 can found in NZ, has the crest; that ep arrived in NZ in 1969. The BBC later used labels with a solid red "logo" - see the sample I posted to the forum earlier. These were in use around 1968 onwards, so there's a slight overlap of the two labels. The Moonbase label was applied by BBC Sydney, so they may have been using up their stock old "crest" stickers while BBC London was using the new "red" ones. If these prints of Ice Warriors and Fury came from overseas, they would have been sent out when the "crest" labels were still in use. As I mentioned earlier, the BBC Sydney labels are generally always typed, which suggests to me that these cans with handwritten labels are not from any of the Asian circuit countries: Australia, NZ, Singapore, Hong Kong. But as Paul V has mentioned, the "Cutting Copy" labels might have been used simply to exhaust old stock, so pinpointing a precise date might be impossible. An even more vital clue for tracing dates, is the plastic film cans themselves. The Tuscan films distributed by BBC Sydney have "Australian Made" stamped on them. The logos and text on these moulds changes over the years, and by plotting the change of can, and the stickers on them, one gets an idea of the "year" the films were distributed.
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Post by Jon Preddle on Sept 20, 2012 23:00:40 GMT
The sale of these two stories to Gibraltar was what I call "back-catalogue", because by late 1973 when these aired, they'd already played Jon Pertwee's first season earlier that year.
This makes me wonder whether the sale to Gibraltar was so at the very last minute, that the only prints BBC Ent could supply them with at such short notice were old "Cutting Copy" ones they still had (albeit none was actually cut), with the black felt pen notations on them as we see them. After transmission in Gibraltar, they were duly returned, however something else was returned in the Fury can. (The 16B, 11C notations being either Gibraltar's or the BBC's before or after delievery.) And since the labels said Cutting Copy, they were duly refiled in the room at Villiers House where Cutting Copies were kept, rather than being stored where broadcast films were filed.
(Yeah, I'm getting desperate for ideas now!)
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Post by Jon Preddle on Sept 20, 2012 23:58:02 GMT
Right, here's something else I've noticed!
The BBC Ent code on the first can reads 16/4ENT/41472 - which is actually the correct code for episode one!
The code for ep 2 should be 16/4ENT/41632.
The noted duration 24.25 is closer to part one's 'official' length (24.21) than part two's (24.10), and the noted footage 915 is closer to eps one's as recorded by the ABC (which is 917) than ep 2's (ABC have 908).
So, the right film was in the right can after all! The true error lies in the "TWO" being written instead of ONE.
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Post by George D on Sept 21, 2012 2:14:46 GMT
You bring up a very interesting concept which is, if they were sent to a station and they put the fury together, then they might not have been able to put it back in the can so instead they simply sent it back with something else.
However since the labels are old, all we know is late 1960s/early 1970s they were in the can. 1988, a day after they were returned, David found the can empty. There is no verification of what was in the can any time in between including when the archives recieved the can although we're told something different (unknown) was in the can.
Another question is does Gibraltar edit commercials into their prints? if so, then I would lean against these being Gibraltar copies because if they had them and used them, they would have put commercials in which would have created splices.
Assuming they were sent to any station, the germany experiment is still a possiblitity. They could have sent 4 reels of ice warriors and the finale of fury from the deep to give them a feel for the series. Which could explain the incomplete nature . Also Fury 6 as a climatic ending which would be a great additional selling point. Another possiblity is the 4 Ice Warriors episodes comes from the Germany set and the Fury happened to be a random episode in the cutting room library.
We also dont know what was in the fury can when enterprises recieved it. While its a common belief and most likely that the contents were not correct, there is no verification as the contents were never identified.
Your thoughts about the labels lead me to believe that they were put on late 60s early 70s. My gut is the cutting room labels would have been in the cutting room dept. I agree that the cutting room dept might have had old labels and did not update their labels at the same time. however they wouldnt have been used much later.
If someone has information on the dates and/or locations of the cans, i would be interested in hearing that also.
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Post by Jon Preddle on Sept 21, 2012 3:25:45 GMT
Another question is does Gibraltar edit commercials into their prints? if so, then I would lean against these being Gibraltar copies because if they had them and used them, they would have put commercials in which would have created splices. Judging by the 30 minute timeslots published in the Gibraltar Chronicle, there were commercial breaks, but these might have been aired *before* or *after* the episodes rather than during, in which case a splice wouldn't be needed!
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Post by John Andersen on Sept 21, 2012 4:19:36 GMT
Im curious if we know what was in this 1981/82 lot mentioned. Such a shame. I suppose this is where I should make a wistful comment about wishing I had a time machine :/ Even if you had a time machine, George, the employees at BBC Enterprises would have probably taken your machine and destroyed it with those 16mm Doctor Who episodes. It is not known at this time as to what was returned and where it came from. Were there lost Hartnell or Troughton stories in that batch? It is theoretically possible, but nobody knows for sure. It is possible that they could have been Jon Pertwee stories. There might be paperwork out there at the BBC or overseas stations to provide answers to those questions. Richard Molesworth was able to cite this incident in his book because of a witness who was supposedly on the scene around the time or shortly after this event occurred. What disturbs me is that there is also the possibility that this might not have been the only time where overseas 16mm prints of Doctor Who were returned to BBC Enterprises and destroyed after the order to stop junking them was issued in 1978. It is too late now, as usual to prevent prints from being destroyed, but after the archive was formed to preserve BBC programs, it would have been much wiser and safer for all overseas returns to be passed directly on to the archive to see if any of the material was missing. With the findings of what was lost in Sierra Leone in late December and now this revelation, the news over the last nine months have been pretty bad concerning lost episodes.
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Post by George D on Sept 21, 2012 6:16:27 GMT
Hey John,
Thanks so much for your thoughts. While I think you meant to be addressing Greg's comment, I think all of us are in agreement at how disappointed the news has been this year.
Yet while this negative news is coming out, its coming out because of the fine research from people behind the scenes. Paul mentioned that he is doing some new research about the tracing of the prints. My gut is the results will not be good news. I really wish we could dig in Sierra Leone and find them but that appears not to be an option. I realize that we cant turn the clock back and we wish we had this information in the past. But perhaps knowing the truth now, we may finally end up facing some harsh realities and know that we have been as thorough as possible, although perhaps 25 years too late.
A tip of the hat for those who saved what they could. The original audio recorders, John Cura, Ian Levine, Paul V, and everyone too numerous to mention who has done something in this noble task which has taken more time than the 6 years it took the original cast to make them. Every single one of you has done something that will be bringing joy to numerous generations to come and leaving a mark on history that few have the ability to do.
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Post by Paul Vanezis on Sept 21, 2012 8:59:22 GMT
I think we are getting to the point where we have exhausted almost all possibilities.
I'd just like to remind people of where the successes have been though. The bulk of surviving episodes were in the BBC archive and Doctor Who survived far better than many contemporary shows. Whilst it's easy to knock the BBC (and many have on these boards) the truth is that all broadcasters were to a lesser or greater degree, short sighted about archive policy, even companies such as Granada (that kept almost all of Coronation Street, but didn't keep important regional archive).
In regard to returns, most episodes have been recovered from overseas broadcasters, and despite the "110 million viewers worldwide" comments from the BBC publicity machine of the 1980's, missing DW eps were not actually sold to that many countries and the actual number of viewers was far lower.
Almost all domestic returns have been prints taken from BBC premises because the films were being junked.
So where do we stand? The truth is that we're in pretty good shape considering everything against us. We've had 4 episodes back since 1998, 4 more than we have any right to have. This material consists of 1 overseas return and 3 prints taken from the BBC. In the great scheme of things that's a pretty good record. Whilst I'm certain we'll get more material back in the future, who knows when that will be, what it will be and where it'll come from.
In the meantime, we must investigate all the leads and opportunities available to us and hope that a miracle happens, because this far down the line a miracle is what is required.
Paul
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Post by Paul Vanezis on Sept 21, 2012 9:13:56 GMT
As an addendum:
There are so many rumours flying around at the moment, chinese whispers of the BBC hoarding away films and *pick your favourite story* being found intact and secretly being prepared for the 50th anniversary.
Ask yourselves why we have these rumours now? The first is that two episodes have recently been returned. Fantastic news which inspires us all to believe the almost impossible... and we got the same rumours after the last episode was returned... and at a screening of 'The Faceless Ones' #3 in 1987 I was accused of hoarding away all sorts of missing episodes. Secondly, we have the 50th anniversary around the corner and it's easy to believe that the BBC would be able to keep something like that quiet. In reality, they wouldn't be able to keep anything like that quiet, and although we were able to keep the news of the two recoveries last year secret for five months, news did start to leak out as soon as the BBC got involved.
The future of missing episode recoveries is as healthy as it was before the recoveries of last year and that's the best we can hope for.
Paul
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Post by Rob Hutchinson on Sept 21, 2012 10:15:23 GMT
Paul
good couple of posts as i think it is important to quash unfounded rumours where possible.
however, i think that on a previous thread you did intimate that the recoveries last year had opened new lines of inquiry. are these now dead or are they still ongoing?
apologies if you've answered this before - i don't have the time to follow every thread.
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