[HN Gopher] Doctor Who archive expert shares positive update on ...
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Doctor Who archive expert shares positive update on missing episode
Author : gnabgib
Score : 117 points
Date : 2025-10-19 22:04 UTC (7 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.radiotimes.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.radiotimes.com)
| giancarlostoro wrote:
| My biggest annoyance is that it wasn't until Matt Smith that they
| started recording the new Doctor Who episodes correctly with
| film, everything including David Tenant was all camcorder.
| afavour wrote:
| Who is such an interesting show, in the sense that it's
| cultural footprint has always stood in contrast to a relatively
| tiny production budget.
| goalieca wrote:
| Disney blew the budget up and the quality went down.
| tredre3 wrote:
| Uh I didn't realize that Disney was involved in production,
| I thought they were merely distributors.
|
| But yeah, since 2023 Disney has been co-producing. It
| certainly explains some of the choices, but I don't know if
| they can be entirely blamed for the decline of the
| franchise.
| pndy wrote:
| Bad Wolf-Disney co-op was seen by some people as
| salvation which would bring new fresh approach but in the
| end they just speed up the decline of this franchise. And
| that started most likely somewhere around Capaldi's time
| - with prolonged focus on Clara.
|
| BBC should back then pause everything and let fans take a
| break but instead they decided to continue with new
| companion. When that didn't go as expected they tried
| with new showrunner and Doctor; Moffat knew how to run
| this playground, Chibnall despite earlier good
| contributions did not. Then pandemics happen which
| resulted in delays - they tried with shorter series a'la
| _classic_ show format of story split into parts but it
| was already too late. Not mention the stinking bomb
| Chibnall decided to launch to get few minutes of cheap
| thrills, nullifying over 50 years of creative
| contributions to this franchise.
|
| Then there are socio-political elements but that just a
| minuscule of the whole problem.
| vintagedave wrote:
| > the stinking bomb Chibnall decided to launch to get few
| minutes of cheap thrills, nullifying over 50 years of
| creative contributions
|
| For a casual viewer like me -- I haven't seen any of the
| new episodes -- I'm struggling to find what this is
| referring to.
|
| What happened with Clara and the doctors, and Capaldi,
| and what was this thing that nullified 50 years of the
| show?
| ZiiS wrote:
| The doctor is no longer Gallifreyan/Timelord.
| afavour wrote:
| The criticism around Clara is an extension of the
| criticism that's existed since the start of the reboot:
| that the companions get too much focus. Rose was very
| much the entry angle to the revival and made sense but
| the argument goes that Clara took that too far. She feels
| like the main protagonist in a lot of stories and her
| departure is a little controversial in that vein but I'll
| avoid spoiling that.
|
| The nullified thing is known as the "timeless child"
| storyline. The Doctor is retconned to not be a
| Gallifreyan at all and also the source of everyone's
| regenerative powers (or something, I honestly forget). It
| was a totally unnecessary retcon but IMO much worse it
| was incredibly self indulgent. Most of the audience cares
| very little about the Doctor's backstory, they just want
| enough setup to enjoy the adventures.
| pndy wrote:
| I'd say that happened already with 13th Doctor. Bad Wolf-
| Disney DW comes with this "plastic oversaturated filter"
| effect that plagues media productions for 10 years if not
| longer.
| FridayoLeary wrote:
| The old episodes are very quaint. They are quite clearly
| produced on shoestring budgets, some of the plots are quite
| weak and i found it hilarious how bad the actors were at
| faking violence. But none of that mattered, because the team
| were clearly passionate and enjoyed what they were doing and
| did a good job so the end product is charming. Production
| standards have obviously moved on massively since the 1980's
| and we are better off. The modern episodes are much more
| highly polished and coherent but not necessarily more
| popular. Like someone else pointed out the massive influx of
| disney money did nothing and only exacerbated the train wreck
| which was the recent doctor who seasons.
|
| Another film that had a huge impact was monty python and the
| holy grail which was produced with a budget of 75p and ends
| abruptly because the money ran out. But they just turned that
| into a running joke throughout the whole movie.
| scubbo wrote:
| > ends abruptly because the money ran out
|
| It is a literal cop-out.
| wcarss wrote:
| That cop was later my landlord -- he was also the art
| director of the film, and a wonderful storyteller.
| pndy wrote:
| The 2005 return/reboot had a small budget and that could be
| seen in the props which mostly were ordinary items repurposed
| as out of this world technology. But that worked on the
| overall charm of this period - I dare to say that show felt
| realistic in that cheapness.
|
| The regained interest surely allowed to assign more money to
| the series. DW was at the peak during 11th and 12th Doctors
| tenure with BBC America involvement in production - the low-
| quality is mostly gone and more CGI was utilized, and so the
| stories were good. Not mention the good chemistry between all
| main actors.
| ocdtrekkie wrote:
| This is a pretty common scifi thing. The Borg antennas
| being built on the Enterprise's deflector in First Contact
| were bird feeders. Odo was once contained on DS9 in a bread
| maker.
| wlesieutre wrote:
| Luke's lightsaber was famously a Graflex camera flash
| pndy wrote:
| A bread maker? My eyes always focused on these plastic
| pallets used as wall, ceiling panels in DS9...
| AmbroseBierce wrote:
| Cypher -from the Matrix franchise- said it best,
| "Ignorance is bliss". Fun fact about that scene: Studio
| executives wanted it cut but Keanu Reeves insisted on
| using it.
| dcminter wrote:
| Inevitably there's a reddit sub for it (I adore the name
| of it):
|
| https://www.reddit.com/r/Thatsabooklight/
| hdgvhicv wrote:
| The reboot show started losing its way toward the end of
| the 11th Doctor, probably as American money came flooding
| in.
|
| I suspect there's a strong negative correlation between
| audience appreciation and production budget.
| MathMonkeyMan wrote:
| I remember seeing Doctor Who for the first time circa 2011 when
| it was on Amazon Prime. First few seasons were very much early
| 2000s TV, and then suddenly it got all big budget Netflix style
| in season five.
|
| The older look doesn't bother me, though. The same thing
| happened with The Expanse.
| hinkley wrote:
| The Eccleston episodes are a bit on the rough side.
| cm2012 wrote:
| But, some of the better storytelling.
| astrange wrote:
| I watched some of it at the time and thought it was cool,
| but never paid much attention. When I checked in again
| around the Matt Smith era it seemed to have become, um,
| unwatchably twee[0]. Was that on purpose or are the
| people who work on it just permanently like that?
|
| [0] if you need an American English translation, maybe
| "theater kid energy".
| cm2012 wrote:
| Theater kid energy is a great description of the Matt
| Smith era onward.
| saghm wrote:
| IIRC the show runner changed at the same time that Matt
| Smith became the new doctor. The tone change is pretty
| noticeable pretty much right at the start of Season 5 in
| my opinion, even as someone who enjoyed pretty much all
| of it before and after (although I haven't kept up with
| it the past few years mostly due to my TV watching habits
| having changed due to different life circumstances).
| pndy wrote:
| New face, new showrunner and better budged worked pretty
| well and maybe even better than during Tennant's time.
| They hit a good spot with 11th and Amy - social media
| were thriving and I've seen characters all around in fan
| works, memes and discussions.
| thaumasiotes wrote:
| > if you need an American English translation, maybe
| "theater kid energy".
|
| It wouldn't have occurred to me to call _twee_ a foreign
| word. However, my feeling of its meaning was... very
| close to the gloss given on wiktionary (and marked
| "UK"):
|
| >> Overly quaint, dainty, cute or nice.
|
| The unambiguously American Merriam-Webster agrees:
|
| >> affectedly or excessively dainty, delicate, cute, or
| quaint
|
| "Characteristic of theater kids" conveys something
| different to me. Do you disagree with the dictionary
| gloss, or do you think it's a good description of how
| people might describe a performance by theater kids?
| DennisP wrote:
| Did you entirely miss David Tennant? He was pretty
| different than the Matt Smith version, and quite good.
| They had some great storylines too.
| hinkley wrote:
| Some of the best story arcs start in those episodes. I
| warned the family when we sat down to watch it together.
| MathMonkeyMan wrote:
| When I saw the first episode of the first season of the
| reboot, I was hooked. I couldn't believe that there was
| really a show that went all in with that zany, campy, sci-
| fi vibe. There's something about the britishness that makes
| it work.
|
| A time traveling alien with a Northern accent investigates
| killer mall mannequins, one of which possesses a trash bin
| that then eats the costar's boyfriend and transforms him
| into a plastic golem. They get to the heart of the
| infestation, and the Doctor readies his weapon -- "anti-
| plastic," of course -- but desires not to use it as he
| struggles to talk intergalactic law with the malignant
| plastic blob. Then he runs off with the girl for adventures
| in future episodes.
|
| Many of the flavor-of-the-week sci-fi concepts were quite
| good, and some were not. But anthropomorphic cat nuns! A
| giant head! Evil buckets with eye stalks! Killer statues
| that can only move when you're not looking!
|
| Maybe it was some inner child aging out of me, but I feel
| like the show's writing took a nose dive about halfway
| through Peter Capaldi's Doctor.
| electroglyph wrote:
| gotta check out Lexx
| gnabgib wrote:
| Lexx (790 the robot head)
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lexx
|
| Starhunter (Caravaggio)
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starhunter
|
| Farscape (Claudia Black before her voice was in every
| computer game) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Farscape
| stickfigure wrote:
| Eccleston had the best dynamic range of any of the actors
| that played the Doctor. He could do funny, sad, angry,
| dorky, brooding, mean, lovable... everything. I wish we
| could have gotten another season or two out of him.
| hinkley wrote:
| He's the creepy husband in The Others which took a second
| to get over. He's so happy to be there as the Doctor.
| dylan604 wrote:
| Season 5 makes it sound like it was a this century show the
| way you've stated it. Dr. Who is older than I am, and we
| don't need to get into how old that is. "Who" has been
| restarted so many times that it seems strange to refer to
| season five without any more info. In fact, not being a Who
| follower, how do they differentiate just by the actor playing
| the doctor? Season 5 of actorName?
| tredre3 wrote:
| I also got caught on how GP said Season 5 which would have
| been from the 60s, not the 2000s. But apparently it is
| correct (unless you want to be pedantic about the choice of
| word Series/Season).
|
| The listing of seasons on Wikipedia goes:
|
| Season 1-26 (1963-1989)
|
| Series 1-15 (2005-2025)
| MathMonkeyMan wrote:
| Yes, I meant the 2005 series.
| jaredsohn wrote:
| And they started renumbering at 1 for 2023-2025 when it
| went to Disney Plus (to onboard new people and because
| they don't have rights to older episodes.)
| hsbauauvhabzb wrote:
| To add to the confusion, the series recently started at S01
| again. Not a reboot, same doctor as the previous season.
| alternatetwo wrote:
| That's not true. With Planet of the Dead it was filmed in HD.
| And no NuWho was ever shot on film.
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| Related? There are also missing Beatles performances that were
| also recorded over by the BBC -- one of which (do I have this
| right?) made an appearance in an early Doctor Who episode? I
| _think_ that Doctor Who episode is still in tact.
| mikehall314 wrote:
| Correct. The Beatles appearance on Top of the Pops survives
| only because a clip from that show was used in episode 1 of The
| Chase.
|
| Ironically, The Chase often has rights clearance issues when it
| comes to home release because of this. Beatles music costs a
| fortune to clear, making releases untenable.
|
| Double ironically. This is because the Beatles chose to mime to
| their studio record for Top of the Pops. If they had played
| live, it would have been less of a problem.
| maxfurman wrote:
| FYI pretty much nobody played live on Top of the Pops
| hdgvhicv wrote:
| Nobody sang live, but they were on stage while the filming
| took place
| qingcharles wrote:
| I seem to remember looking into this once. Aren't large
| swathes of TOTP itself missing? Like, entire early decades?
| SoftTalker wrote:
| Also NASA's Landsat program was facing a severe data tape
| shortage in the 1980s and it is likely that Apollo 11 data
| tapes containing the raw video feeds from the moon were erased
| and reused at this time. (per Wikipedia, and sometimes claimed
| as "evidence" that the entire mission was faked).
| ant6n wrote:
| The irony is that the animated versions of lost episodes are
| probably much more watchable for most people today than the
| actual episodes, should they ever be found.
| doctor_radium wrote:
| "Since 2023, I and a couple of other key members of the Film is
| Fabulous! team have been aware of a large collection of films,
| thousands of films, that have become vulnerable. That collection
| contains some very important material including a missing episode
| of Doctor Who."
|
| I assume this refers to Network (now defunct UK home video
| company) founder Tim Beddows, who passed away unexpectedly in
| 2023. I remember reading an article about the drama that unfolded
| thereafter (sorry, no links), which mentioned him having a large,
| private collection of vintage material, and the first thing I
| thought is that he probably has a missing episode or two of Who.
|
| Obviously the missing episode of The Web of Fear is out there
| somewhere [0], and I recall speculation, probably from the
| Roobarbs web board [1] that "a couple lost episodes of The Dalek
| Masterplan are in private hands".
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Web_of_Fear [1]
| https://www.zetaminor.com/roobarb/forum.php
| bbarnett wrote:
| Not sure it's obvious it's anywhere. Things can be lost.
|
| Unless you mean we manage faster than light speed, and we get
| ahead of it.
| mikkupikku wrote:
| Apparently it and other missing episodes were found and
| shipped to the BBC archives in 2013, but that one episode
| never arrive. It was presumably stolen en route and sold to a
| private collector.
| bbarnett wrote:
| Fair in one respect. Yet 'presumably' is just that, and it
| could have been lost forever.
| Keyframe wrote:
| These type of things is what gets me excited about video genAI.
| Audio is available, presumably scripts and production notes as
| well. People have done animated reconstructions as well. AI
| reconstructions will probably play in rather well into the effort
| in the future.
| 7jjjjjjj wrote:
| That's disgusting.
| alexpotato wrote:
| I upvoted on the title of this post alone.
|
| Always great to see folks trying to save history (of any kind).
| ndsipa_pomu wrote:
| These kinds of shenanigans (BBC not keeping a copy of their
| productions) is one of the reasons that I'm a datahoarder and
| keep a large library of films/tv series that I'm interested in
| (mainly Scifi and horror).
|
| The scary thing with streaming services is that even modern
| productions can become inaccessible via legal means e.g. the 28
| Days Later film wasn't available when the 28 Years Later film was
| being shot.
|
| Personally, I'm not a fan of the BBC as their online iPlayer
| service is terrible at letting me (a license payer) watch older
| productions that my money has contributed towards. Even shows
| from a few months ago become inaccessible as their default
| lifespan is 30 days on iPlayer. Some real old classics are easier
| to find on YouTube than BBC's iPlayer service.
|
| There's definitely a "dark ages" of TV shows and films from the
| 70s/80s/90s as digital recording wasn't as common, so unpopular
| shows will just slip through the cracks as no streamer will be
| interested and there won't be decent copies available to be
| pirated.
| Ylpertnodi wrote:
| >There's definitely a "dark ages" of TV shows and films from
| the 70s/80s/90s as digital recording wasn't as common, so
| unpopular shows will just slip through the cracks [.]
|
| Perhaps letting a few 'slip through the cracks' is the Bbc's
| way of purging the "dark ages...of TV shows". A lot of strange
| things were happening around TV during those times.
| ndsipa_pomu wrote:
| It's not just the BBC - there's lots of less popular
| broadcasts that will be lost to time.
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