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The Web of Fear
I clearly remember buying the Web of Fear – it was the now departed MVC in
Manchester and even at the time I was appalled at it being spread across
three discs. Thankfully they stopped that wasteful and expensive idea straight away. I
recently reviewed
Downtime, the Yeti sequel which builds on this story and
the Abominable Snowmen and I explained there why I’ve never liked the Yeti
stories. I’ve heard the Web of Fear CDs a couple of times but I can’t
bring myself to watch the surviving episode. I’ve seen the first couple of
minutes but I’m simply not interested. I wouldn’t mind a battle between
the Yeti and the enormous Wombles who used to be on Top of the Pops but if
all you’re giving me is the sound of a sphere being pulled across a carpet
you can keep it.
 - vs -
FFFFIIIIIIIIGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHTTTTTTTTTTTTT
Fury From the Deep
Fury From the Deep was the bed fellow of Power of the Daleks in the second
wave of audio tape releases. Narrated in the first person by Tom Baker,
they give a strange slant to the story. I got Fury from Waterstones in
Manchester one evening. We were there to see Michael Palin give a little
talk about Ernest Hemmingway and then sign copies of his Hemmingway book.
He spoke for about an hour – good value for one of Britain’s top
raconteurs and a three quid ticket – but I wasn’t interested in his book
so I went for a mooch round while everyone else in the audience queued up.
I went upstairs to where the tapes lived – unsure whether I should’ve been
upstairs since everyone else was downstairs – and chose Fury From the Deep
from the huge selection of five Doctor Who cassette tapes. In these days
of literally hundreds of CDs, it is nice to remember a time when there
were five and that number included the Genesis of the Daleks / Slipback
release. By "nice" I obviously mean "rubbish".
Hemingway - never read him, probably never will.
The Wheel in Space
The Wheel in Space is the other partly existing story on the Cybermen
video. This one suffers from there being two missing episodes before and
two missing episodes between. A couple of throwaway lines from Colin Baker
didn’t help bridge the gap. If only he’d said that nothing happens in
episode one and barely anything happens in episode two I would’ve been
better disposed to being dumped in the middle of a story like someone who has snickered through the first hour of Harry Potter and
suddenly finds themselves single. The only bit I remember from it is the
amusing death scene of the chap who looks like an Italian waiter and who
is surrounded to death by cybermats. And even that was in “Resistance is
Useless”.
Salvation for the Wheel in
Space came from the CD and Wendy Padbury's not unappealing narration. Of
all the voices used for these talking books, hers is undoubtedly the most
attractive. Purves adds gravitas, Hines has a sparkle and Russell and Ford
can claim to be originals but it is Padbury who brings sexy to the
microphone. She doesn't have the soft R which would make her voice truly
dreamy but the Wheel in Space is a nice thing to drift off to sleep
listening to. As long as you aren't listening to it in the car.
Slowly but surely the metal monsters closed in on the terrified humans
The Dominators
I know I bought the Dominators from the second hand book shop I mentioned
earlier. It was – and probably still is – called Paramount Books and I was
a regular customer for a few years. To this day I think I’m responsible
for their raising the prices of Doctor Who videos. I was in there one day,
looking at nothing in particular, when the guy manning the till asked me
if I knew what the Doctor Who merchandise guide was called. He’d heard
from someone in the business that there was a book which gave suggested
prices for DW stuff and I asked if he meant David Howe’s “Transcendental
Toybox”. I can’t believe he followed David Howe’s advice as he almost
immediately bumped all his Doctor Who tapes up past twenty quid.
Regardless of whether they are out on DVD. I’m no expert but I don’t think
a tape of the Three Doctors is worth £2.50 let alone £25.00. Back when I
got the Dominators things were much less complicated. Seven quid each –
that was your actual Doctor Who video. In my memory I was always in there
buying videos but I look at my shelves and, even allowing for the removal
of DVD stories, there aren’t that many which came from there. But I know
the Dominators did and I know I watched the whole thing that evening and
wasn’t bored out of my amusing mind.
Because Troughton stories
were - and still are - a novelty I put up with the slowness of pace, the
badly characterised baddies, the almost unwatchable picture and the
ludicrous costumes everyone wears. It's basically a pair of big shouldered
alien bitches shouting at each other about who gets to be bitchiest to the
feeblest bunch of natives you'll ever see. The Quarks are the last in a
long line of monsters who were meant to be "the new Daleks". Along with
such other obvious smash hits as the Zarbi and the Chumblies. Did no one
stop to think about any of the reasons why the Daleks were a success? Not
even one of them?
As it is today... in June
The Mind Robber
The Mind Robber was the second story in the 1992 repeat run and is
therefore hugely exciting. Episode one was shown on the night of a
terrible electrical story and in those days such things interfered with
ones reception. BBC2 wasn’t great at the best of times and the storm
caused several picture break-ups. They’re on my old tape and I watched it
so often that I felt a little let down by the pristine DVD copy. They
could’ve added CGI interference as an option. That would’ve been a nice
touch. I also have a memory of watching the Mind Robber before an exam but
as the same memory includes watching “Chock-a-block” that morning I
don’t think it is entirely to be trusted. The Mind Robber fits the time
frame but Fred Harris and a smiling super computer don’t. The memories are
piling up in real time now – it’s the Mind Robber, Chock-a-Block and a
visit to the grave of my maternal grandmother on the anniversary of her
death (long before I was born). All right before an exam which I did
terribly well in.
The internet's only slightly good Chock-a-Block picture (sans Fred Harris)
The Invasion
I had a choice and not long in which to make it. We were in London, in a
WH Smith and the clock was ticking. I could choose one video and one only
– it was the Invasion or the Tom Baker Years. Tom’s tenure hadn’t started
on UK Gold yet and I had only seen the tiniest bits of his era so three
hours of clips and anecdotes and teeth was almost too much to resist. But
in the other corner we had Cybermen and Patrick Troughton and an obviously
brilliant story which had (probably) just had awesome reviews in all the
journals which mattered. I plumped for Doctor Who and the Guinness Factory
and got to excitedly hold it all the way home. 1993/94 was such a fantastic
time to get into Doctor Who. Videos were coming out two a month, UK Gold
was fresh and new, the BBC were repeating stuff and I had twenty six years
of catching up to do. The Invasion was nothing short of fantastic. Tom
Baker’s Mary Tamm anecdote is a joy to behold but it can’t match the Invasion
for sheer fantasticness.
I’m guessing the above happened in 1994 but I couldn’t tell you when in
1994. I can however say that I have an image of myself in the upper sixth
form common room reading the novelisation of the Invasion. That’s rare in
and of itself as I can only remember one other occasion where I sat on the
comfy chairs in said common room and that was listen to Norwich City
playing one of the big Italian clubs in a UEFA Cup game. Normally I used
the common room for my locker (which was regularly opened but only by
people looking for coffee, sugar or anything else they could legally drink
– ours was a refined school and theft was not cricket) and for writing
economics essays during Friday morning free periods. I’ve no idea why I
should’ve bagged one of the comfy chairs and read a slim volume of Ian
Marter’s prose but I did.
A Norwich City fan. Or the Norwich City fan. Celebrating.
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