Marco Polo caption slide

[Jason Thompson]

This is a really trivial point but it's been bugging me for a while now. I keep reading various sources that say the 'next episode' caption at the end of episode 2 reads 'Next Episode: The Cave of Five Hundred Eyes'. whereas the title of the next episode is actually 'Five Hundred Eyes'.

The thing that's bugging me about it is that the episodes have been missing for decades and no-one seems to provide the original source for the claim. The authors of a couple of the books I have read on the subject can't have seen the episodes in question, I'm not sure that the recently discovered telesnaps included the next episode captions, and Marco Polo is one of a very small number of serials for which there is no surviving footage whatsoever.

Does anyone happen to know of a definitve source for this little factoid? Is it definitely true or is it one of those things that has become lore through repetition but may not in fact be true? Is there any way now to verify it short of recovering the missing episode and looking?

[Andrew Curnow]

I have a feeling that the claim is based on internal paperwork (either on the script, or perhaps more likely the request to the graphics department to put the caption slide together) but I'm not sure who would confirm that.

I think there was a similar debate when the RT came to 'recreate' the missing 'Next Episode' caption for part 4 of The Celestial Toymaker, the debate being whether the caption read "Holiday for the Doctor" or "A Holiday for the Doctor", so presumably there are records kept somewhere.

[Andrew Curnow]

It's not all that specific, but the RT site says this about the Celestial Toymaker: "According to all the existing paperwork, the next episode caption read 'Holiday for the Doctor', rather than 'A Holiday for the Doctor' (which appears on-screen in the next episode). It was decided to go with the paperwork in this case." So I guess similar 'existing paperwork' must, erm, exist for Marco Polo?

I suspect Mr Bignell would know much more detail on this!!

[Jason Thompson]

Thanks. I wonder where the original claim came from. Someone looking at some paperwork does seem likely.

[Si Hunt]

Sometimes I generate myths and rumours, but this isn't one of mine.

Si.

[Stuart Wallis]

I suspect Mr Bignell would know much more detail on this!!

I'm sure Dennis Brent would have something to say on the subject...

[Dirk Gently]

Dennis would definitely know, but he wouldn't tell we proles. He'd just read it quietly to himself & smile smugly that he alone knows what it actually said. Or more likely just watch his non-existent DVD transfer of the original recording that he doesn't have.

[Stuart Wallis]

I love evil geniuses who sit in their ivory towers, cackling away at next-to-nothing. Having been the first of the genre, I get a royalty every time.