Doctor Who: The Key to Time (Limited Edition Numbered Complete 7 Disc Box set) [DVD]
Doctor Who: The Key to Time (Limited Edition Numbered Complete 7 Disc Box set) [DVD]
Uniting six complete stories across a full series of Doctor Who in one quest, the Key To Time saga is an ambitious, sometimes too ambitious, piece of television that nonetheless has plenty within it to recommend it. Starring Tom Baker as Doctor Who he’s given a quest by the White Guardian to track down the six constituent parts of the Key to Time. Thus, each of the six stories sees the Doctor and Mary Tamm’s Romana hunting down one of the segments. In many ways showing the highs and the l
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A Season Long Story,
The Key To Time season was the idea of Graham Williams, the producer of Doctor Who to do something that had never been attempted before on the series, that was to essentialy have an entire season length story of 26 episodes but divided into six seperate, but loosely linked narratives.
The William Hartnell era of the show regularly had stories link into one another but prior knowledge of the previous story was not necessary, with The Key To Time season however, it is necessary to a certain extent.
The format for the season is a variation on the ‘Quest scenario’ for an enormously powerful object that has been split into six segments and scattered throughout time and space, each of the six stories is the Doctor’s attempt to locate one of the segments and reconstruct the Key.
The Doctor is sent on his quest by the White Guardian one of the two controlling higher beings of the cosmos, the White Guardian is the Guardian of light in time and is essentialy there to maintain the balance between good and evil, he has an opposite number the Black Guardian who is of course the embodiment of all that is evil and dark. The balance between light and darkness or good and evil is slipping out of phase into the favour of darkness and the White Guardian needs the key to restore the balance, the two Guardians are forbidden to directly involve themselves in universal affairs and must recruit agents whom they can manipulate and carry out their will, thus the White Guardian has recruited the Doctor and the Black Guardian, who also requires the Key, has agents placed in position to prevent the Doctor from carrying out his mission and seize the Key themselves.
The Key To Time boxset was released in America on Region 1 some years ago with limited extras and although I was tempted to buy it I resisted, because I had a feeling that it would’nt be too long before there was a Region 2 release. The special features for this release are awesome, they are without a doubt the most comprehensive package ever put together by the Doctor Who Restoration Team and are clearly designed to tempt the people who bought the region 1 release to double dip and buy this version of the set.
As stated above this season comprises six stories and I will just give a few details about them without revealing the plots, I don’t like reading reviews about things that give the game away and I’m sure that most of the readers don’t either.
‘THE RIBOS OPERATION’ is the story that introduced, not only the quest but a new model of K9 and Mary Tamm as the Time Lady, Romana. Now Mary Tamm has lived in the shadow of Lalla Ward who portrayed the second Romana for some years but is in actual fact just as good as if not better than her successor. She plays the part with a superior know-it-all attitude which irritates the Doctor greatly and there is real friction between them which is refreshing.
This story was written by Robert Holmes, who was without a doubt the greatest writer ever to work on the show, the script simply drips with humour and sophistication and features a trade mark Robert Holmes double act and is the best story of the season.
SPECIAL FEATURES: include a commentary and two documentaries detailing the influence of the producer of the time, Graham Williams, and the making of this story. Continuities and trailers are also presented.
THE PIRATE PLANET is noticeable for being written by the late genius Douglas Adams just prior to The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and you can instantly see just what a giant of a writer he would soon become, another top story with a great plot and characters, but no Arthur Dent sadly.
SPECIAL FEATURES: include two commentaries and a documentary about this story’s production, film inserts, deleted scenes and outakes. These are complimented by continuities and a spoof science programme called Weird Science which looks at the science of the Key to Time.
THE STONES OF BLOOD was the 100th Doctor Who story to be transmitted and is a tale of two halves, one good one bad, the first two episodes are like something out of a Hammer horror, with moving, blood drinking stones, human sacrifices, death cults and a sinister old house, great stuff. However that last two episodes sees the action shift to a space ship and the thick cloying atmosphere of the first half of the story has given way to something a lot more light hearted and is a massive letdown, had the story carried on in the content of the first two parts we would be looking at one of the all time greats as it is now it can only rank as average.
SPECIAL FEATURES: include two commentaries and two documentaries detailing the making of… and the influence of Hammer Horror upon Doctor Who. There is a Mary Tamm visit to the location to discuss stone circles with the local expert and a Blue Peter celebration of the show’s fifteenth anniversary. The usual…
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|A mixed bag, but fun &, unexpectedly perhaps, stylish,
It was rather salutary watching these stories after ploughing through Time-Flight & Arc of Infinity recently. The Key To Time stories have a rather tatty, dashed-off quality, in terms of both writing & production, but what struck me in comparison with the confused, bickersome Davidson/Nyssa/Tegan team-up was how witty, charming & stylish they are. Tom Baker & Mary Tamm (& K-9) play off each other in a continually entertaining way & the writing manages to be adult, sharp & funny while being accessible to children (the reverse of the Arc of Infinity, which had childish dialogue & was incomprehensible in its premisses).
The Ribos Operation was the story I had least fond memories of, being studio-bound & faux-medieval & essentially slight, but the restoration team have really given it a pleasing visual tone: it came across as stylised & quite richly textured & coloured rather than something cheaply shot on video. There’s a sense of fun to the whole thing, though there’s definitely a sense that everyone – particularly the excellent Ian Cuthbertson – has only the barest grasp on his or her lines, & is stumbling through getting them right for one take.
The Pirate Planet is the most intelligent story, & the most science-fictional. The restoration team went back (I think) to the original negatives for all the exterior footage, shot on film, with the curious result that the drab, muddy & nondescript bits of moorland suddenly look rich & lively, instead of letting the whole thing down. Douglas Adams’ script is, dare I say, wildly uneven: the early scenes of the Doctor & Romana trying to meet the natives are slightly desperate comedy, with the inhabitants of Zanak (who think the stars are simply lights in the sky) responding to Romana’s conversational gambits with an implausibly urbane sophistication – & the really intelligent conceptual twists & turns are mostly compressed into the last episode, when explanations get slightly rushed. But the performances are fun, & it is full of wit, and is highly entertaining. Romana gets my favourite line, when the Mentiads’ mental powers are blocked: ‘So much for the paranormal,’ she says, snatching up a ray-gun to despatch a guard. Extras include an extended scene explaining the relationship between the Mentiads’ telepathic awareness & the space-jumping,& establishing that the slightly drab circular light that features in their cave-set is an image seared into all their minds each time the life-force dies. During the credits of a reminsicence extra someone has rendered a cgi polyphase avitron that works rather well, & it would have been fun to see the cso replaced with cgi, & the parrot given some sort of ray weapon rather than rather embarassingly attempt to on K-9.
Androids of Tara is a lively, good-looking Ruritanian fantasy, that scores points for having so much location footage (in good weather, for once). Again the video footage as well as the film footage has been attractively restored so it looks colourful & not cheap. If the story has a weakness it’s that the sci-fi element – the androids – aren’t convincingly incorporated into the quasi-historical setting, & it’s at that sort of point that the dashed-off nature of the writing is laid bare. It comes with a rather charming documentary that revisits the locations & shows us how they look today, sometimes managing to match shots very closely indeed.
Stones of Blood is great fun, again winning points for really charming casting. The location work is shot on video, but looks surprisingly good, & not unlike film, & creates a more coherent look to the story. In the extras is an extended scene including the wonderful exchange (in the face of an Ogri attack), ‘We could be in Plymouth in an hour!’ ‘Plymouth!?’ This scene was simply incorporated into the episode in the region 1 version. Okay, the Megara aren’t very impressive – but rewatching it I felt that at least the flashing, floating lights weren’t clunky badly-done robots with light-bulbs on top of them or people in silver bodystockings. Interesting interviews with stars, director, writer, and designer. Mary Tamm narrates a brief documentary about the Rolright Stones, where the story was set, quite badly, I think, but is otherwise charming. And she is very interesting on her character, career & why she chose to leave the show.
I’m quite fond of The Power Of Kroll, which has some very witty moments, particularly between Rhon Dutt, the Doctor & Romana, as well as some plain bad ones – for instance a holy book that seems to be sitting in a puddle of water at the bottom of a well for no good reason. If only anyone had loved this story enough to redo the model shots! They don’t look quite as bad as one might expect, & Kroll in & of itself is quite a well-made monster, & there’s some attempt at a commentary on colonialism & racism. The swampy locations look rather good, I think…
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|“He probably looked more convincing from the front.”,
I was not really looking forward to the materialisation of this boxset, thinking that I was already too familiar with these 6 serials from 1978. Isn’t it lovely to be wrong sometimes? This is one of the best old-school DR WHO DVD releases this year and not just because the extras are so great(more on them later). From the moment the Doctor is hired by Cyril Luckham’s godlike White Guardian to search time and space for the all-powerful Key to Time, this sequence of 6 stories is never less than fun, if occasionally silly.
Seeing THE RIBOS OPERATION again after several years was probably the biggest surprise for me as I’d previously dismissed it as a bore. Yes, it’s a little stagey, containing polystyrene snow and rubbery monsters but it’s also a sweet little character study. There’s an effective balance here of mildly amusing comedy, along with characters chasing each other around in corridors or catacombs looking like they actually mean it. Tom Baker appears to be enjoying himself, and his delight in the schemes of rogueish intergalactic con-man Garron, played by the excellent Iain Cuthbertson, mirrors my own. Written by popular WHO veteran, Robert Holmes, the show is really about long term working partnerships (or “Holmesian double acts”, if you must).
THE PIRATE PLANET is a love it or hate it affair. I’m inclined to defend it as I’ve always liked Douglas Adams’ humour and inventiveness. It also features the best monster of the season (sort of) in the form of Bruce Purchase’s Pirate Captain, who’s a blustering, bellowing, eye-rolling nutter with an interesting motivation. The fight between his robot parrot and K-9 is a highlight of the season and again Tom Baker looks like he’s having fun but not at the expense of his performance – witness the blistering “then what’s it for?!” scene between him and Purchase in episode 3. Yes I suppose some of the supporting cast are a little dull, but when everything else is so bonkers yet engaging you can mostly forgive it.
Thanks to this boxset, the third story, STONES OF BLOOD, is again, one for which I’ve rediscovered my appreciation. The villainous Cessair of Diplos apparently doesn’t have much motivation for what she’s up to, but there is also the intriguing suggestion that she might be an agent of the Black Guardian (she seems to know that the Doctor is after the Key anyway). Even if the hyperspace scenes don’t always work, the initial set-up of pagan cults,ancient stone circles and blood-drinking monsters is a welcome return to the kind of horror tale that the show seemed to be largely in favour of ditching at the time.
Story number 4, ANDROIDS OF TARA is the best of the set. It’s a sci-fi rip-off of Anthony Hope’s PRISONER OF ZENDA which is by turns elegant, witty, charming and pacey. Tom Baker gives one of the best performances of his “middle” period, probably only equalled or surpassed by his turn in CITY OF DEATH a year later. He’s helped by a strong supporting cast and of course, an outstanding one-off villain in the form of Peter Jeffrey’s charming but ruthless Count Grendel. It’s quite right that this scheming devil of a man should escape at the end but it’s also criminal that there was never a rematch.
THE POWER OF KROLL on the other hand is the weakest story here. It is however, fairly watchable if you’re in the mood. There is a certain hilarious magnificence about men painted green running around Norfolk Marshes (doubling as an alien world) worshipping a quarter-mile wide man-eating squid! It feels like Robert Holmes is on auto-pilot here, not really bothering to create characters for whom one really cares, and this is reflected in the under-powered performances of the cast. But I guess anyone painted green or menaced by rubbery tentacles will have a job creating verisimilitude. POWER OF KROLL may be a bit rubbish, but at least it might make you smile indulgently.
Final segment of the quest, THE ARMAGEDDON FACTOR is so-so. The money has now all but disappeared and writers Bob Baker and Dave Martin don’t quite know how to keep matters tense enough to sustain 6 episodes. On the other hand, the last episode isn’t bad and there are some good ideas at work. It’s great for example, that K-9 is used in a more interesting way than is the norm as he is the only one who can communicate with Mentalis; and the jury-rigging of the nearly-completed Key to Time is a minor stroke of genius.
Overall then the season is the strongest for which producer Graham Williams was responsible, even though admittedly, most of the monsters on offer(especially the Shrivenzales, Ogri and the appalling Taran Wood Beast) are well below par. The Doctor’s relationship with the uppity, cerebral but inexperienced Romana appears to inject a new vitality into the Doctor/companion relationship as does the fact that the Doctor is for the duration a man on a mission rather than a feckless wanderer…
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