Reign of DVD (slightly updated)
2Entertain have informed fans via it’s ClassicDW Twitter Feed that a late addition to its schedule will be the 1964 William Hartnell story The Reign of Terror.
What’s unique about this release is that the story has two episodes missing from the archive (episodes 4 and 5). And, as a fan of this story I would point out these are rather important episodes too, that change the plot from meanderings in revolutionary France to something more serious.
2Entertain has said the story is “to be released as complete as can realistically be achieved.” Which means, to my mind, 3 potential options
1. Animation, as they did with The Invasion in 2006. The problem is that was prohibitively expensive (the only reason it was done for that story was it was paid for by the BBC website for an unrelated aborted project). Costs may have come down in the intervening five years and there may be some fan out there willing to do high-quality flash animation on the cheap. We remain dubious, but this would be the preferred option short of finding the actual episodes.
2. Photographic reconstruction or motion comic. Telesnaps (pictures taken by photographer John Cura of television programs in order for directors and producers to retain a record of the program as broadcast in the days before VCRs) don’t exist for The Reign of Terror, but a good number of stills are around and they could marry it up with the off-air recordings of the broadcast episodes made by fans in the 1960s. Or they could use illustrations and do it motion comic style. 2Entertain has never been a fan of the straight telesnap/photo reconstruction (they nixed a condensed one of Galaxy Four on The Time Meddler DVD) but maybe a motion comic is an idea whose time has come…
3. Some sort of a photographic reconstruction with bridging material. Basically, what they did on the 2003 VHS release, which used Carole Ann Ford’s bridging narration for an abortive 1990s video release and combined it with stills, 8mm footage of broadcast sequences and off-air recording clips. It wasn’t bad, though the impact of what takes place in these pivotal episodes were somewhat lost.
It’s hard to say what they’ll do but as they’re not releasing it til late 2012 they have some time to figure out their options.
One thing that’s interesting about this news is that up until now, 2Entertain has been unwilling to countenance releasing any incomplete stories on DVD. In fact we had been told by the Restoration Team’s Steve Roberts at a DWIN event in 2009 that those incomplete stories (which include The Reign of Terror, The Tenth Planet and The Ice Warriors) weren’t even on the DVD production schedule. Clearly, as they get closer to completing releasing every Doctor Who story on DVD they’re rethinking this policy.
UPDATE (3/4/11): Much to my shame and embarrassment—especially as a) I should have known that detail and b) I am currently reading Richard Bignell’s excellent book Wiped so there’s really no excuse—I had forgotten there are no telesnaps for The Reign of Terror. (Thanks to Will for pointing that out in our comments section). A remark from regular commenter Ryan pointed out the idea of doing it as motion comic. I have changed number 2 to reflect both these points. Thanks Will and Ryan!
Posted by Graeme on Thursday, March 3 at 9:16 am
12 Comments...
Out of the titles you mention I think The Tenth Planet would be the one fans would most like to see released as it represents the final episodes of William Hartnell’s era. Although the final episode appears to be lost forever. The Ice warriors would be nice as it represents early Patrick Troughton and that time is effected the most by the BBC wipe outs.If I was forced to choose only 1 of the 3 then I would say The Tenth Planet. Not only for the reason I mentioned earlier but also because it is the first to feature The Cybermen and in my opinion the most creepy looking and sounding cybermen. Does anyone know if an audio recording of part 4 exists?
Posted by Doug Grandy on 03/03 at 11:36 AM
Audio recordings exist for every 1960s episode. They in fact used the off-air recording for the telesnap reconstruction they did of Tenth Planet 4 on the VHS release.
Posted by Graeme on 03/03 at 11:38 AM
Hopefully this means they’ve also dropped their apparent “ban” (I really can’t think of a better word) on doing more animated episodes. I get the impression they must have gotten soaked for the animation costs for The Invasion given how “enthusiastic” some parties tend to get when the idea of 2 Entertain animating more episodes is brought up on forums (despite the fact there are many more animation houses in the UK and internationally, not to mention many talented fans who would probably do the job for free). I personally don’t buy the argument. If they can afford to make documentaries, they can afford to animate an hour or so; I’ll live with forgoing a Tomorrow’s Times if it means getting The Tenth Planet animated. Or if they can’t find an affordable animation, house, they should ask on Twitter for recommendations. I expect they’ll do some sort of telesnap job, maybe with Reign of Terror packaged with Planet of Giants (which I don’t think is out yet?).
Posted by Alex on 03/03 at 02:16 PM
Steve Roberts’ answer to the question in Enlightenment on animated episodes is very instructive: “Flash animation continues to evolve, becoming faster ,and therefore cheaper, to produce all the time. But it’s still very expensive - one episode of ‘The Invasion’ cost more than the total budget for an average four-part DVD release! A second revenue stream, such as financial aid from a TV channel, would be immensely helpful in bringing these stories back to life.” Which might explain why they’re a mite defensive.
And basically, he’s describing how the Invasion animated episodes were funded, by BBCi, who were going to use it for the iPlayer which was supposed to launch much earlier. When it didn’t, the project was written off and Worldwide got the episodes for a song.
Posted by Graeme on 03/03 at 02:30 PM
Wow, I did not realize that they actually did release Tenth Planet on VHS but then again I never really stayed on top of the VHS releases. I bought some of them but was far from a complete collection. DVD’s however, well I am currently behind by approx 28 titles (where the classic series is concerned) but am buying at least a couple of titles a month. My Goal is to eventually have all available episodes on DVD. (Probably just in time for the next format to come out and start all over again!) Anyways, if all else fails I suppose they could just release The Tenth Planet the same way they did on VHS although as Graeme noted 2Entertain would prefer not to do it that way.
Posted by Doug Grandy on 03/03 at 02:57 PM
A telesnap reconstruction of “The Reign of Terror” would be a bit difficult as (IIRC) telesnaps from this story are not known to exist.
Posted by Will Brehm on 03/03 at 04:47 PM
Wow! this is great news! about time ... i too DO NOT buy the argument that its just “too expensive” to do animated recons of the missing episodes. Give us a break BBC! DW pulls in MILLIONS of POUNDS for them, the least they can do after destroying all the stories is to shed a few quid and give us back decent reconstructions of the incomplete stories.
And then they can start a series of dvds for the stories that are completely missing. If marketed right, they would make back more than they would spend on them.
Posted by Ian on 03/03 at 09:31 PM
What about doing it in some form of motion comic style?
Posted by Ryan on 03/04 at 10:00 AM
Will: I completely forgot that! I’m terribly embarrassed especially as I’m reading Richard Bignell’s book on missing episodes Wiped right now!
Ryan: That’s actually a really brilliant idea. I hadn’t thought of that.
I’ve updated the blog post to include these things.
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