Dr Who From The Start?

monquixote

Really enjoyed all the Dr Who stuff that's been on the telly recently and thought is would be interesting to watch the whole thing from the start. 

Having looked into it the early series were about 50 episodes and lots of them are lost.

My plan is now to watch the early Hartnoll ones then skip to the Troughton ones and watch the ones where there is a whole intact serial (it's this time when most of them seem to be missing) 

I figured from Pertwee on I'd watch all of them (assuming I can sit through the insufferable Colin Baker). 

Anyone else tried this and got any tips and recommendations?

fretmeister

There are about 150stories! But about 850 episodes !!!

johnnyurq

Some of the gaps have been plugged by episodes and whole series that were discovered in South Africa and Australia/NZ IIRC and these will be appearing at some indeterminate time in the future (see what I did there).

Since the Beeb gave a general amnesty on tech, director and producers on stuff they ahem kept fro their showreels etc an awful lot of wiped BBC stuff has tipped up.

One was an ex Beeb cameraman who was responsible for all the TOTPs now cliched special FX, he ahd Dr Who stuff and a whole lot besides. Including rare TOTPs appearances like the one of Bowie and Mick Ronson et al doing Starman and others.

As I understand it the BBC will obviously monetise and bleed them first with DVDs etc but they intend eventually for it to go up for the newer iteration of iPlayer for license payers as part of the larger project of archiving and making it available.

Now my info is most likely out of date so if you still have Beeb contacts I would ask around. I believe the issues they are grappling wiht now is how to technically stop non license fee payers form around the world form gaining access.

To that end if the info out there is correct then there is a limited beta of it somewhere like BBC America/North America, with the idea prove its security their first on a small number, then roll it out.

So I wouldn't hold my breath.

There are certainly specialist websites dealing with the repatriation of Dr Who and other BBC stuff from all over the world.

As I say this could have changed or been shelved since I last got wind of the and some of it may not be entirely accurate.

Poor old Colin Baker he was a bit of a doofus but I reckon he was poorly served by the scripts of the time due to the wrangling/death knell (from the cloister bell maybe) going on behind the scenes by JNT and co.

monquixote

Sorry didn't really make that very clear. There are about 50 episodes per season so though there are only 3 Hartnell series there are about 150 episodes. 

dindude

monquixote said:

Anyone else tried this and got any tips and recommendations?

Get a good divorce lawyer?

monquixote

dindude said:

monquixote said:

Anyone else tried this and got any tips and recommendations?

Get a good divorce lawyer?

The wife likes Dr Who more than I do!

TimmyO

You'd watch the Sylvester McCoy stuff? :-/ 

axisus

My pal at work is a Who fanatic and seems to have memorised every fact and detail about it ever (for example, he could tell you things like the name of the 5th episode in the 3rd series, first appearance of the ice warriors, etc etc). He has 'everything', and apparently there are still audio tracks available for the episodes that are lost. 

As one of my young daughters is a mini-fanatic, we often borrow old episodes for her to watch. Some of them have terrible production values, but there are also some great stories if you can get past that. Some terrible stories as well!

Actually, if I didn't have to work for a living and had more spare time, I think that would be a great idea to watch everything. Not enough time in life as it is though.

monquixote

TimmyO said:

You'd watch the Sylvester McCoy stuff? :-/ 

I don't have a problem sith McCoy. I'm a child of the 80's so I like him. 

Lixarto

TimmyO said:

You'd watch the Sylvester McCoy stuff? :-/ 

Some of it is fantastic. "Remembrance of the Daleks" is STILL the best Dalek story.

monquixote

I get the impression that people didn't like his initial persona so he changed it quite a bit and it improved as a result. 

Lixarto

There was also The Cartmel Masterplan

johnnyurq

@Lixarto it has been said that Moffat aided and abetted by the usual suspects (big finish and the like folks) aim to introduce some of the main themes of The Cartmel Masterplan. Do your insider friends have any wisdom in this area?

It would be lovely if so.

I just remembered today that one of my oldest friends brothers struck up a long standing friendship with Tom Baker who gave then gave him a K9 that was on the show with him for a good while, lucky bastard. 

Me jealous, bloody right I am.

monquixote

Episode 1 watched. 

Cave of Skulls next

holnrew

I've been thinking the same, but it's a big commitment.

Lixarto

johnnyurq said: @Lixarto it has been said that Moffat aided and abetted by the usual suspects (big finish and the like folks) aim to introduce some of the main themes of The Cartmel Masterplan. Do your insider friends have any wisdom in this area?

I think some of the main themes have already been introduced. His part in the Time War is, I think, indicative of his position as (possibly) more than yer average Time Lord (there are other reasons he's not average of course).

The "painting" solution is also reminiscent of the events of "The Gallifrey Chronicles" which has the Time Lords being saved from aprevious Time War - readers of these books would be looking more than the televised Time War than they actually got - in the novels events, it was hinted pretty heavily the Doctor was on The Other Side when the War began.

I'm liking where the 50th Special has left things. Let's get Trenzalore out of the way and move on, eh?

johnnyurq

Yes it rings a bell and I wonder if any of Lungbarrow will find its way in too, it has been a while since I read it but genetic looms and the rest sounds interesting.

Me too I thoroughly enjoyed it and looking forward to the Xmas one and Capaldi's tenure too.

A part of me wants to see more of Hurt's and McGann's doctors time.

PolarityMan

Wow that is an epic undertaking indeed. 

fatherjack

For the early Hartnell ones, I wouldn't recommend getting to watch a story all in one sitting unless you have access to amphetamines.

mellowsun

I'd watch the Patrick Troughton, Jon Pertwee and Tom Baker episodes. I used to have all the paperbacks so it'd be good to see the screen versions. As a kid, I never missed a Tom Baker episode, but I was too young to have seen much of the Pertwee doctor first time round, I only really remember Planet of the Spiders.

I wouldn't bother with the later doctors, I remember them with too much disappointment. There were a few good Peter Davidson stories, but he was hopelessly wet as Doctor Who imho. The less said about the next two the better, but the problem there was more the stories than the choice of doctor.

I'm not a big fan of the reboot, although I can see its appeal. It's too much of a soap opera a lot of the time.

TTony

monquixote said:

Episode 1 watched. 

Cave of Skulls next

Are you streaming them all from somewhere?