2 thoughts on “Doctor Who – Remembrance Of The Daleks – Special Edition [DVD]”
A chunky reissue So here it is, the third release of this story (while the other three stories of the 1988 season aren’t even on the horizon…), which everyone else here is arguing about, possibly rightly.This is a divisive story from a divisive period of Dr Who. Basically, you either love Sylvester McCoy or hate him; he started as a comedian who stuck ferrets down his trousers etc, and then, as the Doctor, was called upon to be dark and mysterious. Sometimes it works, sometimes not. This is his first story as the dark-and-mysterious Doctor, and it doesn’t always sit comfortably. However there is plenty else going on; finally the series has abandoned the pantomime that blighted the previous series, and here we have a story of warring Dalek factions attempting to steal the uber-powerful “rrrremote stellar manipulator” from the Doctor – but why does he want them to have it? There is a good cast here (stunt casting of comedians is restricted to a minor character for once) and a complex plot which moves quickly enough to jump any plot holes. In one of Doctor Who’s all-time cool moments, Ace beats up a Dalek with a baseball bat; another high point is the Doctor’s philosophical musing about whether to have sugar in his tea. And lots of stuff gets blown up. I love it. Your mileage may vary.Extras (2 hours)Commentary track with Sylvester McCoy and Sophie Aldred. ***Production and trivia subtitles. ***”Back To School” (36 min) documentary on the making of the serial. Informative and fun. ****”Remembrances” (15 min) documentary on the many, many continuity references in the serial. Essential viewing for anyone new to Old Who, and good fun to watch. ****”Davros Connections” (43 min) Interesting, if rather static, overview of Davros’s life and portrayal, which draws on his appearances in the series up to Remembrance and also on the various audio plays about him (but not the novels). However, being a reissue from 2007, it drops the ball by failing to include any mention of Julian Bleach’s portrayal from last year. ****Photo gallery (8 min) (beefed up mightily from the original version) ***Deleted scenes and outtakes (12 min and 4 min)(with linking narration) ***Multi-angle sequences (2 min) (that actually work this time) ***Trailers from the 1988 broadcast (5 min) (got me nostalgic for Joan Hickson’s Miss Marple and anti-nostalgic for Colin’s Sandwich)***5.1 surround sound, a music-only option and a Radio Times article. ***To sum up:Definitely buy this if:*You never had a copy before. It’s a cracking story with over 90 minutes of interesting documentary material, including a very interesting 43-minute documentary on Davros which partly draws on the various audio releases.Maybe buy this if:*You have the original version of the disc but found it a let-down with all the general quality lapses and puny supporting extras. You’re basically only paying for the extras.Don’t buy this if:*You already have the Davros box set version. There’s nothing new here.*You can’t stand Sylvester McCoy’s Doctor. Obviously :)I’ll be keeping this and taking my old duff version to the charity shop.
A Sylvester McCoy story well worth remembering After a messy and unsatisfying first season in the role, Sylvester McCoy’s Doctor emerged from a bit of a rethink as a more satisfyingly enigmatic, more proactive and slightly darker figure in Remembrance of the Daleks, a really rather splendid entry celebrating the show’s 25th anniversary that works both as a nostalgic look back on the series’ past and a pretty good yarn on its own terms. Set in 1963, the references to the show’s history come thick and fast – not only does it feature the same junkyard where the TARDIS was discovered in the very first episode as well as the school his granddaughter went to as key locations but at one point a character leaves the room just before that episode is about to start on TV. There’s even a reference to Bernard Quatermass’ rocket programme at one point. If you don’t know the show’s history or your British scifi TV they don’t get in the way, but if you do they add a nice additional layer that doesn’t get too obsessively self-referential that it stops the story dead in its tracks as with the homage overload in Die Another Day. Nor is the increasingly tiresome but contractually obligatory Davros allowed to dominate the proceedings for once.It also looks like they’ve put enough money into the show for once: a mechanical effect of a full sized shuttle landing in a school playground is especially impressive. Focussing on a race war between black Daleks and white Daleks carried out on Earth with hidden Timelord technology the prize, the theme of racial purity is taken further with a group of human racist fascists collaborating with one faction. There’s even room for one wonderfully wistful philosophical exchange about the ramifications of having sugar in your tea or not – after all, if no-one developed the taste for sugar, one minor character’s grandparents would never have been sold into slavery and he’d have been an African instead of a Londoner. It’s ultimately quite pertinent to the story’s payoff, which even the Doctor isn’t sure is a case of doing the right thing or the wrong thing (and which some fans consider the cause of the catastrophic Time War that preceded the revamped series in the 21st century). But most of all, as well as being clearly thought through, it’s also highly entertaining without being patronising, which can’t be said of most of the latter `Classic Who’ episodes on much-loathed producer John Nathan Turner’s watch. Oh yes, and this was the story that first answered the question `How do the Daleks handle stairs?’As for the double-dip special edition DVD, the improvement in picture quality isn’t that big (and at a couple of points the digital noise reduction is on the verge of being overdone and flattening out facial detail), but the new special features are an improvement over the original single-disc issue, with a good making of documentary and a nice retrospective featurette on all the script’s references to past stories, though whether the 48-minute documentary on Davros quite merited a disc of its own is open to question. All the other extras from the original release have been retained.
A chunky reissue So here it is, the third release of this story (while the other three stories of the 1988 season aren’t even on the horizon…), which everyone else here is arguing about, possibly rightly.This is a divisive story from a divisive period of Dr Who. Basically, you either love Sylvester McCoy or hate him; he started as a comedian who stuck ferrets down his trousers etc, and then, as the Doctor, was called upon to be dark and mysterious. Sometimes it works, sometimes not. This is his first story as the dark-and-mysterious Doctor, and it doesn’t always sit comfortably. However there is plenty else going on; finally the series has abandoned the pantomime that blighted the previous series, and here we have a story of warring Dalek factions attempting to steal the uber-powerful “rrrremote stellar manipulator” from the Doctor – but why does he want them to have it? There is a good cast here (stunt casting of comedians is restricted to a minor character for once) and a complex plot which moves quickly enough to jump any plot holes. In one of Doctor Who’s all-time cool moments, Ace beats up a Dalek with a baseball bat; another high point is the Doctor’s philosophical musing about whether to have sugar in his tea. And lots of stuff gets blown up. I love it. Your mileage may vary.Extras (2 hours)Commentary track with Sylvester McCoy and Sophie Aldred. ***Production and trivia subtitles. ***”Back To School” (36 min) documentary on the making of the serial. Informative and fun. ****”Remembrances” (15 min) documentary on the many, many continuity references in the serial. Essential viewing for anyone new to Old Who, and good fun to watch. ****”Davros Connections” (43 min) Interesting, if rather static, overview of Davros’s life and portrayal, which draws on his appearances in the series up to Remembrance and also on the various audio plays about him (but not the novels). However, being a reissue from 2007, it drops the ball by failing to include any mention of Julian Bleach’s portrayal from last year. ****Photo gallery (8 min) (beefed up mightily from the original version) ***Deleted scenes and outtakes (12 min and 4 min)(with linking narration) ***Multi-angle sequences (2 min) (that actually work this time) ***Trailers from the 1988 broadcast (5 min) (got me nostalgic for Joan Hickson’s Miss Marple and anti-nostalgic for Colin’s Sandwich)***5.1 surround sound, a music-only option and a Radio Times article. ***To sum up:Definitely buy this if:*You never had a copy before. It’s a cracking story with over 90 minutes of interesting documentary material, including a very interesting 43-minute documentary on Davros which partly draws on the various audio releases.Maybe buy this if:*You have the original version of the disc but found it a let-down with all the general quality lapses and puny supporting extras. You’re basically only paying for the extras.Don’t buy this if:*You already have the Davros box set version. There’s nothing new here.*You can’t stand Sylvester McCoy’s Doctor. Obviously :)I’ll be keeping this and taking my old duff version to the charity shop.
A Sylvester McCoy story well worth remembering After a messy and unsatisfying first season in the role, Sylvester McCoy’s Doctor emerged from a bit of a rethink as a more satisfyingly enigmatic, more proactive and slightly darker figure in Remembrance of the Daleks, a really rather splendid entry celebrating the show’s 25th anniversary that works both as a nostalgic look back on the series’ past and a pretty good yarn on its own terms. Set in 1963, the references to the show’s history come thick and fast – not only does it feature the same junkyard where the TARDIS was discovered in the very first episode as well as the school his granddaughter went to as key locations but at one point a character leaves the room just before that episode is about to start on TV. There’s even a reference to Bernard Quatermass’ rocket programme at one point. If you don’t know the show’s history or your British scifi TV they don’t get in the way, but if you do they add a nice additional layer that doesn’t get too obsessively self-referential that it stops the story dead in its tracks as with the homage overload in Die Another Day. Nor is the increasingly tiresome but contractually obligatory Davros allowed to dominate the proceedings for once.It also looks like they’ve put enough money into the show for once: a mechanical effect of a full sized shuttle landing in a school playground is especially impressive. Focussing on a race war between black Daleks and white Daleks carried out on Earth with hidden Timelord technology the prize, the theme of racial purity is taken further with a group of human racist fascists collaborating with one faction. There’s even room for one wonderfully wistful philosophical exchange about the ramifications of having sugar in your tea or not – after all, if no-one developed the taste for sugar, one minor character’s grandparents would never have been sold into slavery and he’d have been an African instead of a Londoner. It’s ultimately quite pertinent to the story’s payoff, which even the Doctor isn’t sure is a case of doing the right thing or the wrong thing (and which some fans consider the cause of the catastrophic Time War that preceded the revamped series in the 21st century). But most of all, as well as being clearly thought through, it’s also highly entertaining without being patronising, which can’t be said of most of the latter `Classic Who’ episodes on much-loathed producer John Nathan Turner’s watch. Oh yes, and this was the story that first answered the question `How do the Daleks handle stairs?’As for the double-dip special edition DVD, the improvement in picture quality isn’t that big (and at a couple of points the digital noise reduction is on the verge of being overdone and flattening out facial detail), but the new special features are an improvement over the original single-disc issue, with a good making of documentary and a nice retrospective featurette on all the script’s references to past stories, though whether the 48-minute documentary on Davros quite merited a disc of its own is open to question. All the other extras from the original release have been retained.