Dalek War: Frontier In Space / Planet of The Daleks DVD

[Anthony Williams]

Thing is, those fans are precisely the ones who are going to buy every DVD on the day of release and pay full whack for it- or at least a bit more than those who don't fancy the story that much and are prepared to wait for it to drop in price six months down the line.

Maybe, but store price-cuts don't affect 2|E at all... the cost of the actual product is around half of the RRP. However, even if the retailers are selling the product at less than half the RRP, more often than not, it is the retailer that is making the loss on the product, not the supplier. Unless, of course, the supplier has come up with a deal with retailers in order to clear excess stock...

However, my point is, 2|E would still see a return on their product, whether bought now or in 6 months' time. That's the thing about the Who range - most of the titles will continue selling.

Ant x

[Pip Madeley]

You took the words right out of my mouth.

Anyway, Lovefilm are sending me 'Frontier' today so we'll see if I enjoy it more than previously - I may even have lamb curry with it, Mr Pavlova

[Jonno]

Bought this tonight at Sainsbury's - I now have 8 stories to get through on the shelf, one on order, and need to buy 4 more. Thank goodness there's no more this year!

[Simon R]

We finished "Frontier" this evening. The botched ending is a crying shame. Where does the Master go? Could they not have added some dialogue in "Planet of the Daleks" to try and explain it if it was too late to re-film anything?

[shada pavlova]

I may even have lamb curry with it, Mr Pavlova

I promise you won't be disappointed.

[Thasc]

What a brilliant documentary about Roger Delgado, A fascinating insight into a wonderful actor. It was nice to have a bit of background about his parents Matilda and Roger Snr. And those photos of Baby Roger were absolutely gorgeous awww. Some fantastic previously unseen photos to look at and some great clips from other BBC shows too. Kismet came across as a very warm and friendly lady, it was heartbreaking to hear that she said 'Good bye my darling' to Roger's coffin at the crematorium, I had plenty of tissues to hand for that moment I enjoyed watching this documentary so much that I'm going to have to watch it again this weekend

I'm going to settle down and watch Planet of The Daleks this weekend too

[Si Hunt]

"Planet of the Daleks" is a very, very odd story. The TARDIS runs out of air (WTF!?!1!1! OMG!!!) and a message on the scanner reads "Cabin Cannot Support Life". Cabin? CABIN?!!

Then later, Prentis Handjob has a screaming fit shouting at Bernie Horshit "We're never going to get off this planet! The spaceship's wrecked!", completely ignoring the open door of the SPACE SHIP behind him that he's just rescued the Doctor from, without stopping to ask if it still works.

Heeeeeeelp!

Si.

[P-Bal]

Jane How shines like a beacon.

[Si Hunt]

Peter Purves really annoyed me on the Blue Peter clip. He kept saying things which wern't true. At the end of the clip where the Dalek was found by the boy whose Dad was a policeman he said "... and it's not every day you get arrested by a Dalek!" and laughed. But... hang on, that isn't even remotely like anything that happened! And then later, when the other Dalek was found on someone's front drive, he said "It's not every day you find a Dalek hiding in your back garden!". STOP IT! THAT DIDN'T EVEN HAPPEN!

Si.

[Rob McCow]

No! Peter was brilliant, a master-class in making something out of nothing. The exchange with the kid who's dad is a policeman had us in titters.

[Pip Madeley]

I've started the extras on this release - the Delgado documentary was a delight to watch. Well constructed, full of rare clips and interesting anecdotes, it's exactly what an extra should be. Excellent. Unlike the Perfect Scenario, which was a pile of shite.

[Jason Thompson]

Just finished the set (minus the commentary tracks, which I'll get to later on). Overall a good set.

Frontier In Space is still not a favourite story of mine.It's horribly, horribly padded. For three whole episodes the Doctor and Jo are captured, escape, recaptured by various combinations of people, and interrogated by a bunch of obstinate idiots who don't listen to a word they're saying. Whole plotlines happen for no reason. Nothing worthwhile happens in the lunar penal colony at all. The Ogron 'rescue' that forms the cliffhanger to part 2 fails a minute into part 3, thus being one of the least satisfying cliffhanger resolutions ever, since the Doctor and Jo end up right back where they started. Not until halfway through part 5 do we finally see them make progress in convincing anyone of what's actually happening. Not only that, but after almost five episodes of being utterly convinced the Draconians are lying about having agents on Earth and attacking ships, to the point of not even accepting the evidence of the Mind Probe he put so much faith in, General Williams immediately accepts the Draconian Prince telling him the battle cruiser he opened fire on, that led to the war in the first place, was in fact unarmed.

Of course Roger Delgado is superb as the Master, and there are some nice moments (including 'well naturally because we're chasing them you stupid...!'), but overall its a story with only half as much plot as its running time actually needs, and the botched ending doesn't help.

Planet Of The Daleks is much better. It has better pace. It also has its share of padding, but it flows much better and the story feels as if it keeps going, while Frontier just feels like endless repetition. Yes, the story is basically the first Dalek serial re-worked, but so what? It also has possibly the most spectacularly undermined cliffhanger ever. The end of part 1 should have been a massive double-whammy: Invisible Daleks! Instead we have the end of the last story featuring the Daleks, the title being 'Planet Of The Daleks', and the Doctor already having name checked Skaro, Thals and the Daleks five minutes earlier, resulting in no-one being too surprised when the thing they reveal with their spray-paint is a Dalek (which also leads to a bit that always makes me giggle a little: the Doctor's diagnostic spiel which includes the line 'total loss of vision': well of course it has total loss of vision, you just spray painted its eye!)

Episode 3 looks simple amazing. Without knowing anything about the state of the episode and its restoration I would never have noticed anything amiss, and even with the full knowledge of what has been done with it it looks practically indistinguishable from the episodes surrounding it. I look forward to seeing other episodes recoloured to this standard, if it is financially viable to do it.

Extra features were OK. The Perfect Scenario was quite interesting in terms of the material actually covered on the Frotnier disc, putting the story into the context of the time in which it was made, but very badly presented. On the Planet disc it was just rubbish, sadly, since no-one seems able to really make much of the story. The 'making of' features were nice, with everyone clearly enjoying recollections of the story. The Delgado feature was a lovely little piece, though it seemed to misfire in the sections where they describe his appearances in comedy, 'showcasing his talent for it', as he doesn't actually seem to be doing anything very amusing in the chosen clips, the comedy coming from the other actors. Lovely piece though.

A nice set, really. Perhaps they should refrain, however, from trying to make 'dramas' out of documetary features. 'The Perfect Scenario' was in essence very similar to a feature in the 'Beneath The Surface' set, but the one from the earlier set was far superior, dealing with the substance without framing it in crap.

[Si Hunt]

Having been dissapointed with "Frontier" this time around (see the "The Story I'm Watching Today..." thread in "General", fans of inconsistently placed posts), I was surprised to enjoy "Planet" a whole lot more than usual.

The crux is that, unusually, Parts 1 and 2 are the worst episodes. You have to get over the TV Studio jungle, the total loss of all continuity from the earlier story, and some bizarre logical displays like the TARDIS "cabin" (CABIN?!?) "running out of air" (WTF?!) and the Doctor forgetting about the Daleks and the Thals not seeming to notice the TARDIS. The key point comes, funnily enough, when you realise that Part 3 was an unfortunate choice to go missing in colour as it's a very action packed episode. But then, so is Part 4. And Part 5. In fact, the story races on from this point, full of inventive childrens storytelling, much cribbed from "The Daleks" (but who cares) without ever seeming to have continual captures and escapes.

The Daleks are at their childrens favourite best, plotting and scheming ruthelessly. It's got the same kind of "heroes against the odds" feel as The Daleks, and it's basically a surprising lot of fun if you can get past the fact that Terry Nation was a childish writer. His attempts at character development are laughable (e.g Lateps tame romance with Jo, who can work out if she actually likes him or not?) but he does Boys Own adventure stuff superbly - escapes up tunnels on hot air included. The bit where the Doctor opens a lift door to find a Dalek waiting is thrilling stuff. He only slips up when he forgets his idea about invisible Daleks after the first episode - what a missed chance to "show" 10,000 Daleks hovering in the air!

And Codal is so, so obviously in love with the Doctor. Look at the wistful way he looks into Pertwee's eyes at the end. "You've tought me so much," he simpers. It's clear he's only five seconds away from asking HIM to come back to Skaro. But the fool hesistates, and his chance is gone forever.

A good story, and extra poignant when you realise it's Jo Grant's last grasp at travelling in the TARDIS.

Si.

[Si Hunt]

Oh and Jan dug particuarly deep into his hoard for Planet. Daleks in the TARDIS! Amazing!

Si. :mobile

[Pip Madeley]

Oh and Jan dug particuarly deep into his hoard for Planet. Daleks in the TARDIS! Amazing!

Si. :mobile

Daleks AND plant pots no less!

[Si Hunt]

We liked Pertwee saluting the dead Dalek as well.

Si.

[Andrew Curnow]

I know Planet is often dismissed as 'Terry's greatest hits' but at the time that was probably pretty valid - in fact, if I was 7 and had recently read Dr Who and the Daleks based on a story older than I was, seeing some of it 'homaged' in a modern day story would probably be about the most exciting thing ever!! So in many ways I think Planet being a reuse of old ideas is inspired, not a cop out.

[Si Hunt]

It's Terry's All Gold

Si :mobile

[Andrew Curnow]

I wish I'd thought of that!

[Si Hunt]

So do I! Can't claim the credit though! Still, talent borrows, genius steals...

Si.

[Captain Tancredi]

..or as Terrance Dicks often says, it doesn't necessarily have to be your original idea.

Having won the bonus ball at work this last weekend, I gave in to temptation today- strangely it seems that Borders is the last place left in Leeds selling Who DVDs at less than RRP.

[P-Bal]

"Somewhere on this planet there are TEN THOUSAND Daleks!!!!"

[cyberchris35]

I have just watched the extras from Frontier In Space and I just thought I would givve my views on them, the first one I watched was the Roger Delgado biography and I must say it was a well put togeather piece. I loved all the old clips of what he had done before and when it got to the end I was slighly upset about the way he died, such a tragic way to go.
Stripped For Action: The Third Doctor was the usual informative piece about the comic strip and I think that it is a shame that they don't do a few examples of the comic in pdf form on the disk.
I don't really know what to make of Perfect Scenario: Lost Frontier, it is informative and a nice documentary about how Who mirrored what was going on at the time. But I think the whole way they went about it was weird.
The Space War was a good imfomative piece about the making of Frontier.
Frontier has a special significance in my life because the day after episode two was aired I was born.

[Rob McCow]

and I think that it is a shame that they don't do a few examples of the comic in pdf form on the disk.

That's a good idea! Be more interesting than Radio Times entries anyway. I suspect that the rights issues might be too difficult for them, even though it's unlikely that these comics will get reprinted any time soon...