Watching Who from the beginning...

[davethesailor]

Ok, I am thinking about watching all of Doctor Who from episode 1. However, I am not sure of the correct way to do this. What about the missing stories or stories with episodes missing. Do I ignore them, listen to the audios, watch the recons or simply ignore them?

What have you done?

Dave x

[Wayne]

Strictly speaking i didn't do mine in order, because i started with the Davison era, then carried on through Colin, & Sylv, before doubling back to Pertwee then Tom, & finishing on the 60's with Hartnell & finally Troughton.
But i included all the missing episodes as either recon or audio. You have to do them all. It's the only to do it! All or nothing!

[Jonno]

I started watching in order 2 years ago and to try and make it more "fun" wanted to try watching a story per week, at a rate of an episode a day, starting on a Monday. Most stories would thus fit inside a week, and it suited my pace nicely. I got through the Hartnell era in 7-8 months, but as I moved into Troughton, things slowed down - mainly because this was when I started working again (previously I had tended to do my 25 minute fix in the afternoons). Also since then the DVD release schedule has increased rather a lot, plus we've had two new spin-offs to enjoy, so my time with the original series has tended to consist of watching the latest DVD releases, and I have a backlog of those at the moment.

I included the missing episodes on audio, and found it much easier to follow them once the telesnaps kicked in (S4 & 5 mainly), when I would look at them in old issues of DWM while listening (you can also see most of them on BBCi Who site).

I found it very enjoyable and rewarding, and will resume (Ice Warriors is next) when time allows.

[Si Hunt]

You have to do them in order, and here is no excuse for missing any. Stories that arn't available on video should be acted out in the living room using wigs, props and silly voices.

Si.

[Pip Madeley]

Stories that arn't available on video should be acted out in the living room using wigs, props and silly voices.

That actually sounds quite fun, you could split into teams and each present a five minute version of a lost classic.

[Larry]

watching athem all in transmision order I did not bother about the missing stories as I don't have them on audio - i'd been wanting to watch all my complete stories (about 120 odd) in transmision order for some some and finally got around to it 18 months ago. You do start out with good intentions and targets and I raced through the Hartnell and Troughton stories in about a month you also have to be disciplined as many a time you feel like giving up.

I have ground to a halt on many occasions especaily when it came to the awful stories but I have stuck to it and I'm now up to season 18.

[Rob McCow]

We watched recons where we had them, but for some stories it's better to just listen to the audios. The two advantages of the CD audios are that the sound quality is 10,000x better and the narration usually makes it possible to follow what's going on much better than the recon.

For the full effect, it's better to a) look at the telesnaps at http://www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho/classic/photonovels/ , then watch the recon, then listen to the audio. But the telesnaps at least give you more of a flavour of the story.

Plus you wouldn't want to miss out Marco Polo, Galaxy 4 and Evil of the Daleks!

[Wayne]

you also have to be disciplined as many a time you feel like giving up.

You make it sound like an endurance test.

[Ralph]

You make it sound like an endurance test.

Yes that sentence caught my eye too - it's not easy being a fan...

[Wayne]

Well i must admit some stories were hard going. Dull Hartnell historicals like The Gunfighters, The Romans, & Marco Polo spring to mind.
I mainly did it because there was so much stuff that was new to me at the time, & i wanted to have a personal knowledge of every story.
But i don't think i'll ever do it again!

[Carol Baynes]

The amount of storis I've seen has probbaly doubled in the last three years, with a lot of help from new DVD releases, kind people helping out and Youtube! I don't buy that many DVDs though. I haven't bought anything since the "New beginnings" box set about a year ago. When there's a DVD releases of a story I've seen about 30 times, I tend to spend my money on CDs or clothes instead!

[Captain Tancredi]

I did this a few years back and my approach was to listen to the audios of the missing episodes in bed last thing at night- as part of the point of the activity was to get myself in the habit of using my exercise bike I needed to stick to the stories I could see.

[Zbigniev Hamson]

I did this and I always tried to get recons of the missing episodes and only listened to the audios when I couldn't get hold of a recon. In hindsight I think I enjoyed the audios more than the recons.

The recons can be a bit hit and miss. I got them off the net so they were from a variety of sources. The audio is usually much worse than the cleaned up audio CDs, sometimes the pictures and captions just don't tell you what is going on clearly enough (I had to listen to the audio for episode 1 of The Wheel in Space because I didn't have a f*cking clue what had been happening from the recon), and even when they are actually well done, you just end up being distracted by things like CGI Daleks and Yeti and obviously doctored photographs.

I would recommend sticking with the audios. The only recons worth seeing are ones which just use the telesnaps as they are without fiddling with them or adding CGI and couple this with a good soundtrack. Unfortunately the only one of these I found was the official Power of the Daleks one. Stick with the audios then just browse through the telesnaps on the BBC site afterwards if there are any.

[Zbigniev Hamson]

Also, I found Marco Polo works extremely well on audio, it might even be better than the real thing (certainly better than recons).

And also remember that the Sergeant in the Celestial Toymaker is quite clearly an army sergeant, and not a police sergeant as the narration claims for some reason

[Jason Thompson]

I found the best way to do it was to watch two episodes per night, and I watched recons if I had them or listened to audios when I didn't. Basically my rule was 'if I have some visual version of it I watch it on the TV, and resort to audio only when I have to. Doctor Who is a televisual show, after all.

[Antony Cox]

I'm still way behind in collection 'visual' versions of the existing stories, never mind the audios of the missing ones, but if I did have them all then I'd just watch the existing stories and listen to the missing ones all in the correct order.

[Si Hunt]

Who wouldn't want to settle down to the "Massacre" recon with its four surviving photos.

I actually stopped living.

Si.

[Zbigniev Hamson]

Basically my rule was 'if I have some visual version of it I watch it on the TV, and resort to audio only when I have to. Doctor Who is a televisual show, after all.

But when the show in question doesn't exist anymore, and you only have the soundtrack and three publicity photos available, the televisual nature is pretty difficult to recreate and you might as well be watching paint dry while listening to the audio.

[Larry]

You make it sound like an endurance test.

well when you have to watch The Sensorites, The Web Planet , The Dominators and Colonny in Space, it certainly feels like one.

[Pip Madeley]

Who wouldn't want to settle down to the "Massacre" recon with its four surviving photos.

Pip Productions will not be tackling that nightmare.

[Phillip Culley]

Who wouldn't want to settle down to the "Massacre" recon with its four surviving photos.

I actually stopped living.

Si.

Depends if you had to endure that really old one from the late 90's which had so little material they used things like a caption saying 'Old Woman' cause they didn't have a picture of her, or the newer Loose Cannon one, which is an improvement

[Milky Tears]

I last watched/listened to every episode in order during my Big Doctor Who Marathon: November 2004 - December 2005.

Even managed to do 'The Space Pirates' in two nights!


Before that, there was my Original Doctor Who Marathon: November 1998 -December 1999. Started the night after I finally got all the complete Hartnell/Troughton stories off UK Gold.


Thinking of starting my third marathon on the 45th Anniversary!

[Paul Clement]

Steve and I started on the Doctor Who marathon a few years back. We watched one story ona Wednesday night and one on a Sunday night, unless they were long stories and were done over two nights. This worked, recons and all until Gunfighters, when Steve decided after 1 episode that he couldn't watch anymore. We skipped it but after that it became too easy to also ignore certain recon stories we weren't as keen on such as Highlanders and Macra Terror.

[Captain Tancredi]

After taking the best part of four years to watch every story in order and then a flirtation with complete randomness, my current tack is to watch stories in the order in which I first saw them, beginning with the Five Faces stories and then into S19. It gets complicated after a while because I don't have any real way of knowing when I first saw certain stories from copies, but it sounds good for the moment anyway.

[Zbigniev Hamson]

Steve and I started on the Doctor Who marathon a few years back. We watched one story ona Wednesday night and one on a Sunday night, unless they were long stories and were done over two nights. This worked, recons and all until Gunfighters, when Steve decided after 1 episode that he couldn't watch anymore. We skipped it but after that it became too easy to also ignore certain recon stories we weren't as keen on such as Highlanders and Macra Terror.

I can't quite believe you could sit through recons/audios of the Celestial Toymaker IN ONE SITTING... and yet be unable to make it past one episode of the Gunfighters. Were you on happy pills that night or something?!