Commentary Highlights:

The first real big-hitter in the commentary stakes brings together Philip Hinchcliffe, Elisabeth Sladen and Tom Baker, so perhaps unsurprisingly it’s Baker’s comments which are the real treasures, whether it’s his opening admission that he can’t really remember anything about ‘Ark’ (although he recognises Wendy Williams on sight), runaway archbishops or musings on fan love; Hinchcliffe tends to let the actors lead the discussion and fills in some of the gaps, while it’s also interesting to hear Sladen recall how difficult a story it is for her to watch because of the uncertainty she was feeling about the direction Sarah’s character was taking at the time and doubts about her future in the Hinchcliffe/Holmes regime. But it’s thoroughly good fun throughout and does really give a sense that these people have known each other and enjoyed each other’s company on and off for about thirty years.

I Didn’t Know That Before I Read The Information Text:

John Lucarotti’s ‘Ark in Space’ script wasn’t the first version- there was another script before this by another writer and Lucarotti took over the basic premise to write his own story.

In a rather nice piece of symmetry, this release balances the first use of new CGI effects and space station schematics with nearly ten minutes of the original model footage. The CGI effects are shiny and clean, but the model shots are pure silent comedy- it’s a miracle that any actually made it into the finished programme, because the effect of the shuttlecraft taking off from Nerva goes to about eight takes, with and without magnesium flares- by the fourth or fifth take when it gets stuck a few inches above its launch pad, you can imagine a visual effects designer giving the model the full Basil Fawlty treatment once the camera was turned off. It’s also rather quaint that the effect of the shuttle flying through space seems to have been accomplished by swinging it in front of the camera like a pendulum. Otherwise there’s a rather nice ten-minute specially-recorded interview with Roger Murray-Leach which covers a range of his desing work, and then what would probably come under Sir Thomas Beecham’s heading of "lollipops"- readily available treats which are nice to have but don’t really add anything to your understanding- some title sequence test footage, a local news interview with Tom Baker from the filming of ‘Revenge of the Cybermen’ at Wookey Hole, a photo gallery which appears to include a shot from ‘Terror of the Zygons’ and the original BBC1 trailer for the first episode. We make a fuss about a minute-long trailer to promote an entire season these days, but in 1975 you got 50 seconds to promote 25 minutes of three people talking. And there’s the first TARDIS-cam, one of a series of rather attractive visual effects projects- here it’s the TARDIS, a crashed spaceship and a Cyber head on a stormy desert planet.