Doctor Who Club of Australia

[Genlock]

I've been lucky enough to view DVDs of the BBCi webcasts.
Even though the animation is rather basic, it's still entertaining and carries the story well.

Considering it's extremely unlikely that the 180 (?) missing episodes will ever be recovered, (barring the use of some as yet undiscovered technology eg: wormholes to the past that allow a tv signal through, ((see Stephen Baxter)), or a FTL craft that could travel out 40-50 light years with a really big antenna to record the original broadcast, or contact with an ET civilastion somewhere nearby that's been recording "earth broadcasts" for the last 70 years), do you think re-creating missing episodes by combining some form of animation with surviving original audio is a good idea? And where both original audio and video is missing, by the use of "sound alike" actors?

I know CGI is likely to be far TOO expensive for such a project for many years, (the New Captain Scarlet CGI series cost millions), and that 2D animation may also be too expensive, but something along the line of the BBCi webcasts might just work out $$$$ wise. Especially where such animations could be used as a "bridge" in stories where only some episodes are missing.

I've seen a few of the Loose Canon re-creations, and as good as they are, they are limited by surviving photographic material. Being able to create new material should/could make for a visually more interesting experience. Much like a graphic novel with an audio track.

What do you think?
Would you purchase such a re-creation if it was made available?
Or is it a sin along the line of colourising classic B&W movies.

[Greg]

I've not voted because there's no single simple answer from my perspective.

[charlie]

Yes the animation is basic and they are fun to watch but you dont need to find dvds of them. They are still on the bbc website for classic Doctor. By the way why isnt there a section for the webcasts?

I think if they have all the sound then they should make the animation to go with it but if they have bits missing then they should redo the whole thing or rewrite it to fit. I woldnt like it if they mixed animation with B&W footage or kept switching between clips and animation. However the clips should at lest be in the special features.

I wouldnt want to see Billy in colour. That might spoil the charm.
I would like them to be webcatst so I dont hev to pay for them.

I would buy the recreations if they used William Hartnell recordings and not voice likenesses. I might find a pirate or something if they were likenesses.

[Genlock]

[lodgey]

I would love to see the missing episodes animated. After all, it was meant to be seen and heard, not just heard as an audio track.

There are two problems that I could see.

The first is cost. While I enjoyed the webcasts on the BBCs website, the audio that goes with them seems more like that of a radio play than a televised program. Much better animation would be required to provide a tv-like experience with the existing audio.

I don't know how hard decent animation is, but I would expect it to be time consuming at least to match the on-screen action with the sounds correctly. This would drive up the cost that the BBC would need to recoup somehow.

The second problem is what about stories where 3 out of 4 episodes exist in good (or at least fixable) condition? You could simply animate the missing episode, but wouldn't that be just a bit jarring watching the original telecast, jumping to animation, and then jumping back again? I would definitely download a story set up like that, and would probably even buy it if I saw it on DVD, but you might cut back your potential audience.

I suppose it would be a bit much to assume that a group of fans are already doing this, possibly asking the downloader to supply the original audio? I thought so. Oh well.

If the BBC ever decides this is a good idea, then I will be interested, But I would ask that any existing fragments from re-created episodes be made available in the same medium as the animated episode itself.

I would love to see more episodes of the 1st & 2nd Doctors, but I think that the cost of re-creating the episodes will prevent me from being able to do so.

ps. Just in case anyone thought I was serious about that group of fans I refered to earlier: Aside from any potential legal issues (a topic I know very little about) see what I said about the animation quality of the webcasts. You would need to do much better than that to make this worthwhile.

[the penguin]

well this is new to me missing episodes in animation very clever bbc also loose cannon productions (http://www.recons.com/) reconstuct them and you get some of the missing episodes by sending the a blank vhs tape

[silver_smurfer]

[Greg]

[SharazJek]

I was heavily involved as the club's liaison with both ABC and BBC Worldwide at the time of the black and white screenings in 2003.

The BBC was as surprised as anybody that the ABC would screen black and white episodes at this time.

Although the ABC said they were 'committed' to screening the entire classic series through to 1989's Survival, the BBC told me that the ABC were under no obligation to keep screening it if they felt the ratings weren't good enough. So to keep screening most of the existing complete black and whites is a good indication that that ratings were reasonable at the very least, considering it was up against prime time news on other networks.

At the time it was announced that 'The War Games' was not going to be screened there was an outcry from the fans, so I did try to get some clarification as to why it couldn't be screened without the Dalek clip from episode 10 deleted. Contrary to the ABC's advice that the story was 'unavailable for contractual reasons', I was assured by the BBC that the story had been offered as part of the package, but with the deleted Dalek clip. It was assumed by my sources at the BBC that as it was a ten-parter, ie. 2 weeks worth of air-time, the ABC was keen to get into the colour episodes as the black and whites were beginning to look tired in the ratings.

This seems plausible to me, since much of the black and white material was screened during the non-ratings summer months. I can understand the ABC wanting to hurry up the colour episodes going into the autumn period.

Of course, the ABC doesn't have to explain why they do what they do. But boy it was great to have Doctor Who going in prime-time for those few years wasn't it!!

[FredDag]

I think good 2d animation would be a good compromise for the lost B&W episodes. I wouldn't buy a DVD with web type animation on it. I find it hard to watch. Something along the lines of the Invasion would be great. I'm sure fans would mind paying an extra couple of dollars for the Animated DVDs to cover the costs. Maybe the BBC should wait to release stuff like that until it becomes more affordable for them to make animations to go with the soundtracks and release full 60's stories until then. I'd love the see Power and Evil of the Daleks released in good Animated formats.

[Sulp Niar]

I reckon they should do The Macra Terror now. It's all about marketing, isn't it?

I think the main reason we should get animation is, simply, that we won't get the missing episodes by themselves on DVD. If they hadn't of animated those two episodes of The Invasion, we never would have got it - since Lost in Time seemed to favour those almost completely missing from the archives. However if it's entirely impossible to have animation, then simply having the missing episodes in their audiobook format (with a cast member or whoever reading the action) would be good enough for me.

[silver_smurfer]

[Greg]

[charlie]

The reason I like the b + w whos is because they weren't able to do great special effects and they knew it, so the stories relied on having an interesting story IMO. And being a young whoover I haven't seen the missing ones and never can so I applaud any attempt to recreate them so I too can enjoy these lost classics.

[silver_smurfer]

[silver_smurfer]

[Greg]

And by selectively quoting what I had to say, you miss a possible extra reason why they might have chosen to not show The War Games - although, as I said, it's pure speculation on my part.

You can say the same thing over and over again, it is unlikely to convince me (or anyone else!) of your position if you haven't already done so. (Especially if your level of evidence is saying that your sources at the BBC told you something - hearsay is not acceptable as evidence.)

You can slag off the ABC Board, and I wouldn't necessarily disagree with you, but when the bottom line is reached, the ABC doesn't exist to show Doctor Who. I doubt the ABC Board, whether stacked with Liberal stooges or otherwise, paid very much attention to the run of Doctor Who and no amount of negative comment on a small forum is gouing cause them to travel back in time and change things so that they show The War Games when it should have been run.

Do you have anything to say on the actual topic of this thread - recreation of missing episodes using animation, etc?

[SharazJek]

[ADAMK]

From Outpost Gallifrey:

[Greg]

I was about to post this news, Adam!

The original announcement can be read here.