The Caves of Androzani (S21 - The Collection)

Disc 7 contains what has often been voted the greatest Doctor Who story of all time. More recent polls might favour some of the post 2005 episodes like Blink or Heaven Sent, but The Caves of Androzani still holds its own as arguably the best of the classic era.

It had a reissue in one of the "Revisitations" box sets, so we've already seen most of the extras. 

What we get here new is a version of the story with optional new VFX - the fifth story to feature this on the set.

Other than establishing shots of the twin planets and the Monument Valley-like TARDIS landing site, these effects mainly deal with the Magma Beast and spaceships.

The monster is a lot more mobile than the very static costume, though that hasn't been replaced totally here. It's primarily close-ups which benefit from the new CGI, giving it more animated features.

Model work of Stotz's ship is replaced on a couple of occasions.

There has been a lot of criticism regarding the use of AI in the recent box-sets. This has been used to sharpen the image, but on occasion has interfered with actors' faces.

Its use is particularly noticeable in Part One of this story, in the scene set in Morgus' office where he has his video-link chat with Chellak. Morgus' face loses all movement, the lips hardly matching his dialogue.

Quite unnecessary to have employed this at all, especially if it is actually going to spoil the image rather than improve it. You'll notice the AI in operation on other stories, especially in TARDIS scenes.

Luckily the Behind the Sofa panellists are only watching edited highlights of the regular version, so director Graeme Harper's thoughts on this go unrecorded.

He joins the Fifth Doctor sofa, and unlike other guest viewers so far has a lot more involvement in the discussions about what they are watching. 

Everyone comments on how adult and dark this story is, with Aldred and Padbury stating they would have liked to have seen at least a little humour to lighten the mood occasionally.

As a story it is unrelentingly bleak, like Logopolis having an ominous feel throughout. (We go into these knowing that the Doctor is going to "die" at the conclusion, and this mood permeates the entire story in both cases).

Other than the Magma Beast costume, which was never all that prominent in the original broadcast, you really can't fault the story. Casting is perfect for every role - no stunt casting this time; the lighting is kept low and atmospheric; and - despite rehashing elements from the less than perfect The Power of Kroll - the writing is some of Robert Holmes' best. It just goes to show the difference it makes when the same material, more or less, is given to an innovative director.

Interestingly, it's not Davison who gets teary-eyed at the regeneration scene, but Colin Baker, who has nothing but praise for his predecessor's Doctor.

Of the extras we've seen before, this being Davison's last story, they have included the regular stuff like "Tomorrow's Times" and "Stripped For Action" covering the Fifth Doctor era. 

That big documentary presented by Davison's son-in-law (what ever happened to him?) is also included here.

This is the last time we'll see Davison watch his own stories. Hopefully he'll be back on a sofa for some of the Troughton ones when they finally get round to releasing them, as that was his favourite Doctor.

Planet of Fire (S21 - The Collection)

Disc 6 of the set could be described as the runt of the litter.

If you want a Special Edition of Planet of Fire then you have to look to Disc 9, one of two Extras discs in this set, for the previously released 75 minute omnibus version. As well as new VFX, director Fiona Cumming drastically edited it down and added a prologue featuring the crash of the Trion spaceship carrying Turlough's father and brother.

As for the main story disc, apart from the Behind the Sofa there are no new extras either - and this doesn't even have a guest viewer on the Fifth Doctor sofa.

Personally, I wasn't too keen on the SE as too much detail was cut, and the prologue rather jarred with the broadcast version in its look and feel.

The similar re-edit on Cumming's Enlightenment worked a lot better.

As for the story itself, Peter Grimwade was given a huge shopping list of things to include - writing out Turlough, including providing some background to the character; writing out Kamelion; writing in new companion Peri; having the Master involved (and potentially writing him out as well); plus making extensive use of a foreign location.

He argued that he should have been invited to the location recce, as he could have fed this into his writing. But JNT didn't want another director possibly interfering with Cumming's ideas for shots. Also, JNT had fallen out with him by this stage due to his perceived snub following the postponement of "Warhead", when Grimwade didn't invite him to a meal.

Saward did attend the recce, but claimed he was employed as little more than a chauffeur.

This will prove to be the writer / director's final contribution to the series.

Considering the shopping list, Grimwade does well incorporating everything in a fairly satisfactory manner. Turlough gets his background (the writer having introduced him and already plotted a backstory for him) and it's fitting that the Master be involved in Kamelion's demise as he was there in the beginning. Peri takes some getting used to, as initially she's a bit of a spoiled brat.

The plot is a bit clichéd, with a society worshipping an ancient alien visitor, and there's the obvious inspiration from She, which had already inspired The Brain of Morbius. (I find it hard to believe the similarity in planet names is just coincidence).

The location looks great - just a pity they couldn't have used a British location for the opening to act as contrast. It looks like the TARDIS has simply moved elsewhere on the island.

The Art of... Fury From The Deep

Victor Pemberton was quite insistent that he be the only one to novelise his story, and managed to convince Target to allow him to do so with an increased page count, usually only 127 or so pages. Range editor Nigel Robinson worked with Pemberton to try to reduce it but found this impossible, so it went out as a "Bumper Volume" with 189 pages - but at a higher price.

Pemberton gave some of the characters first names - such as Harris being Frank, Van Lutyens being Pieter and Price being David. Background motivation is added for Robson - his wife died in a car crash whilst he was at the wheel some 20 years beforehand. Blaming himself, he has thrown himself into his work to the point of obsession.

Interestingly, despite Pemberton's claims to have invented it, the sonic screwdriver does not appear in the opening beach scene with the pipeline inspection hatch.

The cover is a rather low-key affair by artist David McAllister, depicting a conventional drilling platform far out at sea, with tendrils of seaweed rising in the foreground. Perhaps more ominous weather conditions might have given the cover more atmosphere.

Paul Mark Tams had put forward an art concept following his commission to provide the cover for the novelisation of Doctor Who radio drama Slipback, but this was not taken up as it featured a Doctor other than the current one. (Tams, who was also involved in the music industry, had previously contributed artwork for the Doctor Who and Dalek annuals, and would go on to be one of those responsible for the single "Doctor In Distress". He later championed attempts to get K-9 back on screen, collaborating with Bob Baker).

The novel was published in 1986. A reprint was scheduled for June 1994, but the reprint range was discontinued before this could happen.

The soundtrack was first released as part of the BBC Audio Collection in cassette format, featuring a photomontage cover depicting images from the location filming of the opening episode - Troughton wearing his distinctive woolly hat.

The narrative was linked by Tom Baker, in character as the Fourth Doctor recalling this adventure.

This was released in October 1993.

February 2004 saw the soundtrack re-released on CD, this time with narration by Frazer Hines. The colourful cover montage once again relied on location images from Episode One, but also found room for Mr Quill from the recovered Australian censor clips, as well as an entirely made-up gas rig design.

Those censor clips had featured on the Lost In Time DVD set, released in 2004. This also included film trims from Episode 6 as well as some colour home movie footage of the climactic scenes.

The story was animated and released on DVD / Blu-ray in September 2020 on Region 2, though US fans had to wait until the following March for the Region 1 version. (Australia only had to wait two months).

As usual there was an expensive steelbook release to accompany the regular one. Its artwork opted to concentrate on the sequences added to the story depicting giant tentacles of seaweed threatening the helicopter - scenes which never appeared in the televised programme. We also see them grabbing the TARDIS, something which doesn't even appear in the animation.

The novelisation was released as an audiobook in July 2011, read by David Troughton, and using the McAllister artwork.

And finally, another photomontage piece of artwork used to illustrate the story on the moviedb website prior to the animation being released. This actually uses the correct sea fort locations used for the rigs as filmed by Hugh David.

Resurrection of the Daleks (S21 - The Collection)

The first of the Season 21 stories to have had a Special Edition release on DVD with lots of extras, so Resurrection of the Daleks covers Discs 4 and 5. 

On the first we have the original two part, 45 minute episode version - necessitated at the time due to the BBC's coverage of the 1984 Winter Olympics.

The four part version - how it was meant to be screened had it not been for Torvill & Dean - is on Disc 5. Whichever version you choose to watch, the option to do so with new VFX applies to both.

The most noticeable changes are that the Dalek battlecruiser and the prison space station have been replaced, so the brief attack by the former on the latter looks much better. Their final destruction is also new.

Other than that, new effects work is light - mainly weaponry energy beams. The Daleks now have a slight blue outline added when hit by a gun - suggesting some sort of forcefield or the energy is simply bouncing off their armour.

The Supreme no longer appears against a bright white backdrop on the TARDIS scanner. It's now backed by the red-lit control room.

Leela has now been included in the flashback sequence as the Doctor's memories are being drained.

Resurrection of the Daleks is a story which was fairly rapidly reappraised after being repeatedly voted second best of the season (after The Caves of Androzani, though one Australian fan poll placed it top).

It was popular for being the first Dalek story for several years, the new iteration of Davros, and lots of action. It was always claimed it had more on-screen deaths than The Terminator.

However, it soon began to be looked upon less favourably - mainly due to the script. It simply had too much crammed into it, with subplots which weren't terribly well developed - the main one being the sudden plan to have a duplicate Doctor assassinate the High Council of Time Lords.

The violence isn't really an issue - even though it includes the use of non-fantasy pistols and machine guns. The toxic gas effects are a different matter, however.

Eric Saward has himself claimed it's the worst script he ever contributed to the series. (In the new documentary he steps back a bit from that comment).

Watching it again (the two part version) some of the violence does stand out, and not always in a good way - and you can see problems with pacing and those non-starter subplots.

Tegan's departure isn't terribly well set up. It's a lovely scene, but there's just no build-up to the moment - it just comes out of nowhere. Fielding herself now claims to be okay with it - arguing that motivation for actions often lies beneath the surface, and only seems to spring from nowhere.

The Behind the Sofa is on Disc 4, and the guest viewer for this one is Rula Lenska, who played prison medic Styles.

They all comment on the fact that one of the characters is seen smoking. There's regret from Padbury, Waterhouse and Sutton that they never got to do a Dalek story - but then they are all pleased to see themselves included in that flashback sequence.

This disc also has a brand new Making-Of documentary (50 mins), with Davison and Fielding interviewed at the Butler's Wharf location. "Terror on the Thames" includes contributions from Saward, Mark Strickson, Terry Molloy, director Matthew Robinson and surviving guest cast members, plus an archive appearance from JNT.

The rest of the material is a collection of brief TV spots. One of these is the odd Walrus piece - a BBC Wales series, in which a housewife talks with the Dalek Invasion of Earth Supreme.

A compilation of clips from Saturday Superstore all deal with JNT's threatened scrapping of the Police Box TARDIS.

Disc 5 is given over to Janet Fielding, this being her final story. As well as a couple of archive interviews we have her in conversation with Matthew Sweet. The most interesting part of this is the story of her journalist ex-husband and his arms dealing. There's also much talk about her days with experimental theatre companies. She speaks about her cancer diagnosis, though this is covered more in the latest Toby Hadoke "Weekend With..." feature. Usually recorded over a weekend as the name implies, Fielding only had limited time to film this so it's simply "48 Hours of Fielding".

Recorded in and around her current home town of Ramsgate, she introduces Hadoke to some of her friends oveer coffee, visits the local wildlife sanctuary, and they pay a call on the youth club which she is involved with. There's a bit more mention of Doctor Who this time.

I've been critical of Fielding in the past, but this has been when she has been part of a larger group - on the sofa, in documentaries, or as part of the DVD commentaries, especially if Peter Davison is also present. She tends to dominate in such settings and others - notably Sutton - tend to be frozen out.

I enjoyed a lot more seeing her speak just on her own - showing more of a vulnerable side. Like her companion co-star, it's a remarkably eventful life she has led.

Frontios (S21 - The Collection)

Disc 3 covers Frontios, and it also has the option to watch with new VFX. 

The first thing you notice is the view of the planet on the TARDIS scanner. It was grey originally but is now red, to match the studio establishing shot of the crashed colony ship. This looks a lot better. We also have new meteorite effects.

For the scenes where Tegan, Turlough and Norna go up to the top of the ship with the acid battery, the sky is now reddish. It was an annoying brilliant white in the broadcast version.

Victims of the Tractators are still bathed in a purple light, but the creatures themselves now have a purple glow at the tip of their antennae when they use them. 

The biggest change comes with the sequence in which the Gravis reconstitutes the TARDIS in Part 4. As well as an overlaid video effect we have some CGI scenes of the rocks dissolving. We also get a glimpse of other parts of the TARDIS interior.

As well as a hitherto unseen area - almost TV Movie-ish - there's actually a glimpse of Kamelion in one of these. It was always an annoyance that he was never even referred to in any of the stories between The King's Demons and his departure in Planet of Fire, with one scene in The Awakening being deleted. He should certainly have been talked about when the TARDIS is seemingly destroyed in this story.

As far as the extras are concerned, the sofa panels all seemed to like this one. On the Fifth Doctor sofa for this story is Jeff Rawle, who played Plantagenet.

There is a short (3' 53") interview with Verity Lambert from the Did You See? programme as well as other TV spots and trailers.

A series I used to watch due to its sci-fi trappings was The Adventure Game. The butler always reminded me of the First Doctor. We have an instalment of it here, featuring Janet Fielding as one of the trio of competitors. I shan't say how she got on...

The Awakening (S21 - The Collection)

On to Disc 2 of the Season 21 Blu-ray box set, and The Awakening also offers viewers the chance to watch with new VFX. But if you're expecting any new Malus - big or small - you're in for disappointment. The only new effects concern the apparitions, getting rid of the blocky BBC Micro computer graphics and replacing them with twinkling lights. The phantoms also fade in and out in more satisfying fashion - but that's your lot. There's not a lot you could have done with the big face in the church, other than to give it more expression, but I did think they might have replaced the smaller creature which appears in the TARDIS. Even the church's destruction remains intact from the broadcast version - a none too bad model sequence.

This two-parter had a larger than usual percentage of location filming, and this is where this new remastered version really impresses. The footage looks great, and there's not really much more to say about this one - other than I think it is the best of the three Davison two-parters.

As the Behind the Sofa teams say, everyone really looks like they enjoyed making this. After the overly-lit studio work in the season opener, we have a lot more atmospheric lighting in the secret passages and church crypts designed by Barry Newbery - his final contribution to the show after joining it for the very first story back in November 1963. The BBC always excelled at historical costume drama, and this little story certainly benefits from that expertise.

Keith Jayne, who played Will Chandler, joins the Fifth Doctor sofa line-up for this one. Sadly he doesn't contribute much. Waterhouse and Padbury get competitive as to who was the greater genius - Adric or Zoe. It's a shame no-one pointed out to Padbury that writer Eric Pringle had Peter Bryant for an agent - the producer who cast her as Zoe.

This disc is the new home to The (TV) Centre of the Universe - originally split across two DVD releases.

A highlight of this disc - and of the set as a whole - is the Matthew Sweet conversation with Mark Strickson. Fascinating mainly due to the fact that he has led such an eventful life. As with all these items, there isn't a great deal of talk about Doctor Who, but in Strickson's case this is no big deal as his career, and personal life, have been so full of incident - especially his later vocation as a wildlife filmmaker. Definitely one of Sweet's more memorable interviews.

Warriors of the Deep Special Edition (S21 - The Collection)

On previous occasions, when it's come to The Collection box sets, I've waited until I've watched all the stories plus the extras before posting one big review of the whole set. This meant me not reviewing until almost 2 weeks had passed, by the time I'd worked through everything.

This time, as most of the stories of Season 21 have been given updated VFX and there is a lot of additional material, I thought I'd do it differently and post individually on each disc.

We start with Warriors of the Deep, which not only gives you the option of watching new effects but has been quite radically reworked.

Usually, new VFX means replacing model shots with CGI versions, but in this case all of Mat Irvine's model work is preserved. They've simply overlaid new effects to make the models look as though they really are underwater. The only CGI added is an exterior shot of Sea Base 4 with the missile silos opening in Part 4, plus internal shots of the base seen on the control room screen, depicting the missiles in their bay and a small internal harbour in which a mini-submarine can be seen.

The biggest change to the broadcast episodes is the total replacement of the Myrka. The only time you see the original costume is when the beast is already dead, and Nilssen falls on top of it.

The Myrka does other things now as well. Its first victim is killed by it lashing out its tongue to electrocute him.

The notorious scene in which Ingrid Pitt's Dr Solow attempts to kung-fu it is now quite different. We see only her begin her moves, then the Myrka lurches forward and snatches her up in its jaws. This scene was followed by a shot of the command disc lying on the floor, with the dead Solow's outstretched arm. The arm is now seen to be detached from the rest of her!

If you've read the recent DWM Chronicles 1984, you'll know that additional Silurian and Sea Devil material was filmed and edited into the episodes. This comprises mostly close-ups, either of them speaking or of their weaponry in action. All the weapons now fire VFX shots.

One thing you'll notice right away on watching is that the Silurians' third eyes no longer light up when they speak, and the rather squeaky voices have been deepened to make them sound more menacing.

The only time a third eye lights up is when Icthar uses it to show some clips from their previous stories on the control room screen, when he tells the Doctor about their earlier disastrous encounters with humanity.

The episodes have also been reedited to tighten up the pace, so there are fewer scenes of the Sea Devils ambling rather slowly down corridors.

We no longer see any wardrobe malfunctions either, of which there were several on view back in 1984. CGI has also been used to add the occasional eyeball movement to the Sea Devils.

One thing this Special Edition might have benefited from was an omnibus version, if they really wanted to make it feel more fast paced.

Of course, no amount of CGI and reediting can fix all of the problems. The sets are still over-lit, the performances variable, and the continuity errors with those earlier stories persist. Actually, The War Between the Land and the Sea now fits chronologically between this and The Sea Devils - but as that didn't feature the Doctor, the Myrka or Silurian battle-cruisers then those problems remain.

Apart from trailers and other brief TV spots, the only new extra for this story is its Behind the Sofa. They're doing it differently this time by having a guest actor from each story on the sofa with Peter Davison, Janet Fielding and Sarah Sutton. For this story we have Tara Ward, who played Preston.

The two other sofa line-ups comprise Matthew Waterhouse, Sophie Aldred and Wendy Padbury forming a companions one, and Colin Baker with his two companions, Bonnie Langford and Nicola Bryant, making up the third.

Having just watched the Special Edition, it is a little jarring to watch them watching the original broadcast version. It would have been nice to see their reaction to the new Myrka, but of course these panels will have been recorded long before that work was completed.

Personally I found the Aldred / Waterhouse / Padbury one the most entertaining. When one of them observes "Look at them trying to look macho, in their camp outfits", Waterhouse replies that they've just summed up 1980's Doctor Who in a nutshell...

It's a long time since I watched Warriors of the Deep, and I was pleasantly surprised at how much I actually enjoyed watching it again, thanks to this new version. I know there are a lot of purists out there who are only interested in watching the original versions, but I really can't see myself ever revisiting the broadcast version.

Worth the price of the box set alone? Maybe not quite, but there are another 9 discs to come...