Once a month, BBC America is showing a story featuring one of the first 11 Doctors leading up to the 50th Anniversary.

Last month was William Hartnell and The Aztecs.

Tonight was Patrick Troughton and The Cybermen.

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I noticed going to be watching it. I am wondering who they are going to use as the bad guy for Tom Baker. I mean there where several good ones,Davros,Master,Sontarians?

I am also getting all the 11 doctors in Lego esqe. Site has some really cool geek stuff.

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When I am stuck and need to figure something out I always remember the Immortal words of Socrates when he said:"I just drank what?"

Here is the link to the web site
http://www.thinkgeek.com/

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When I am stuck and need to figure something out I always remember the Immortal words of Socrates when he said:"I just drank what?"

Davros. The Master (and UNIT) belongs with Jon Pertwee's era

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Middle Aged Crazy, like Uncle Terry

John Pertwee as the Third Doctor is featured tomorrow with Spearhead From Space.

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It's Tom Baker's turn as the Fourth Doctor is revisited on Sunday.


BBC AMERICA celebrates the fourth Doctor, Tom Baker, in a new special of Doctor Who: The Doctors Revisited, followed by the storyline Pyramids of Mars. Baker played the Doctor for seven consecutive seasons over a seven-year period, making him the longest-serving actor in the part so far. As the Doctor, he quickly made the part his own, and with his eccentric style of dress and speech – particularly his trademark long scarf – immediately became a recognizable figure. Tom Baker, lead writer and executive producer Steven Moffat, producer Marcus Wilson, companion Louise Jameson (Leela), among others, discuss the most alien Doctor to date and Davros, the menacing creator of the Daleks. In the tales of Pyramids of Mars, the Doctor and his companion Sarah Jane Smith (Elisabeth Sladen) attempt to free a pyramid imprisoned Egyptologist from his possession by Sutekh, the last of a powerful alien called the Osirans. Doctor Who: The Doctors Revisited – The Fourth Doctor premieres Sunday, April 28th @ 8:00 p.m. EST/PST.

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Tom Baker as Doc and Leela were my Dr. Who window.

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Elections have consequences.

mine too. used to watch "dr. who" with my mom on PBS when i was a kid, and it was the tom baker years.

I didn't get into Doctor Who until they brought it back, but I've gone back and watched alp of the old ones I could find. Tom Baker was the shit.

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I hate Pyramids of Mars

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When I am stuck and need to figure something out I always remember the Immortal words of Socrates when he said:"I just drank what?"

Well, don't I hate it, but I don't think it's a good choice for Baker's Anniversary episode.

I would have picked either the first of the Key to time or The one with Scarrois. You know the time traveling thing with the Mona Lisa.

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When I am stuck and need to figure something out I always remember the Immortal words of Socrates when he said:"I just drank what?"

I'm okay with the choice.

Maybe Genesis of the Daleks would've been better. Or City of Death.

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Now that I think of it , Invasion of Time.
Perfect story. So many arcs making the cliffhangers better. Great Villain.

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When I am stuck and need to figure something out I always remember the Immortal words of Socrates when he said:"I just drank what?"

Peter Davison is in the spotlight tonight as BBC America revisits the Fifth Doctor with the episode Earthshock.

Enjoy.

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awww fuck they're doing earthshock? with last month's pyramids of mars and now earthshock they're doing shit i've seen already. watch them do fenric's curse for the 7th doctor as opposed to something fun like the happiness patrol, which is quintessential old-who.

or they could do paradise towers just for koragnon

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I think I've seen the same commercials literally 15 times on BBCA. I hate Copper soooo much because of that commercial song and I've never even seen it.

The commercial is awful but the show isn't bad.

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The Sixth Doctor, Colin Baker, had his special tonight, including the episode Vengeance on Varos.

Not bad.

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it was genuinely amusing to watch everyone kissing the 6th doctor's ass like he was BRILLIANT. EDGY. SO PERFECT FOR THE TIME.... ETC....

i still gotta watch the last half of the pre-vengeance-on-varos part and see if they went into detail on the 18 month hiatus and then the trial of a timelord meta-stuff, but even if they did its prolly fluff and glossed over by cheeky chops moffat and his pals giving the standard issue homogenized rosy colored glasses look back on the affair.

if you've got 55 minutes, someone kindly uploaded the "trials and tribulations" documentary that's a special feature on, i believe, the trial of a timelord dvd release/ --- this covers just about everything in far better deal than the squeeing whitewashes that BBCA is giving everyone before playing their classic episodes.

seriously BBCA, wtf.... you run 3 hours of TNG every day, countless hours of chef ramsay and top gear... would it kill you to properly celebrate the 50th and have a classic who hour every night, or at least one night a week in place of you playing robin hood or something? instead of having one off specials attached to moffat and co nadlicking the show about how brilliant and perfect everything was, why not show a bunch of classic who? i reckon it'll do fine in the ratings and it'll help build up the nerd factor in the audience you've already been cultivating for nu-who (i.e. how in the last couple'a years the episodes started airing on the same night that they aired in the UK, etc)

ah well, that'd make too much sense... and really, who doesn't want to watch 4-5 hours of chef ramsay every day/niight/whatever?

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You knew it was gonna always be Moffat waxing nostalgic over every bit of Whoness and each Doctor whether it was deserved or not.

I agree it'd be nice to see all the classic episodes.

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Sylvester McCoy and the Seventh Doctor are up tonight with Remembrance of the Daleks.

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I apparently missed the Eighth Doctor special last month, but the Ninth Doctor special premieres Sunday with Parting of the Ways and Bad Wolf.

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Sadly I remembered watching the pilot on Fox. No wonder it didn't get picked up. Paul McGann was pretty good though.

That little documentary just pisses me off royally. I attended some Dr Who shows, and basically it's Nathan-Turner, in charge of the world. Which, if you had a show that pulled more in in licensing revenues than it costs to make, you might consider that completely right & proper. Except: Dr Who licensing at the time was predominately Tom Baker episodes, for which Nathan-Turner was involved with (well, the last year of Baker, and working as a floor manager. Certainly not someone in charge or who can take credit for the charm & fun of those episodes.)

So: this guy hires Colin Baker because he was great at someone's wedding party. He brings in Mel because he likes Bonnie Langford. Famous for her role in Peter Pan. I won't say she can't act, but from playing Tinkerbelle, I wouldn't automatically assume she could, either. Oh, and she can scream.

Colin Baker: well, I remember him from "The Brothers," an early 70s BBC show where he had the JR Ewing part before there was a JR Ewing. Extremely vile & nasty character. (If you want to know: a sort of soap opera-ish tale about a trucking company as they expand into continental Europe, & all the political/backstabbing/boardroom intrigue shit. All the major players children of the original owner...) Anyway, he's great when you give him something to do. If you give him "camp" to do, he'll do that too.

So we got two people basically cast on whim. We got a guy in charge with an extremely swelled head vis-a-vis his actual role in the BBC. (And yeah, people upstream of him have to be looking for a way to nip this in the bud.) Then we got people upstairs who hate the show in a, "eww, its a children's show" snit. Assholes. Damned children's show brings in more viewers than your goddamned high-faluttin' "programmes" -- someone with brains would encourage shows that do well, maybe attempt to put some more of the same. What I know is, if Kukla, Fran and Ollie outdrew Playhouse, I'd have Kukla, Fran and Ollie on prime time.

Colin? Well, they dressed him in that idiot outfit. Better to have had him in that for an episode or so, have him flinch in horror, then set the thing on fire. He could've spent the rest of the time like Pertwee, and done better... They had shit writers. I'm sorry, but the writing for that show tanked, certainly by Tom Baker's last year. Davison's scripts were abysmal. Colin was presenting a meaner, edgier version of the character, which meant more violence could be seen, done to or by, the Doctor. (Even Pertwee episodes, where he did judo, were not as jarring.)

A real good time for an anti violence on TV thing to be going on. Although, don't fool yourself. A lot of this was really, nipping Nathan-Turner's swelled head. E.g., a convenient excuse.

I look at the subsequent hiring of Sylvester McCoy. The earlier, nonsensical episodes weren't jarringly violent. What they tried to do is transfer that into a physical actor, who could do stunts, play "spoons," whatever, to keep the kiddies attention. Which made for some really bad episodes (Paradise Towers, that episode with the "CandyMan", & Delta and the Bannermen) -- also, the sound recording in the first year was beyond "bad.")

What was the point? I forget. Oh yeah: Nathan-Turner sucks. The 6th Floor sucks. Their ineptitude was felt all the way to the reboot. And &*!#&!! ( documentaries that present spin city-style excuses should be taken out & shot.) And Lew Grade. Shot. Turner's gone, unless someone wants to exhume him & shoot the carcass.

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Middle Aged Crazy, like Uncle Terry

I *do* like what McCoy did to his character after the first year. A darker, mysterious doctor is much more interesting to me.

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Middle Aged Crazy, like Uncle Terry

Going back both watching and reading. He has moved higher as well as Davidson.
Davidson had it the worst replacing T Baker. You know who I really did not like? Troutan or Hartnell.

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When I am stuck and need to figure something out I always remember the Immortal words of Socrates when he said:"I just drank what?"

Under Troughton it was definitely a kids show, with cheesy villains/sets. But he also made the Doctor a friendly character, who *could* be killed. There's not an episode of Hartnell's where you got the same feeling. More of how they each played the character, I think.

Some of the best episodes were done during Hartnell's period. My favorite would be "Dalek Invasion of Earth", which had a real nice movie-like quality to it. In fact it was so good, they redid it as a movie with Peter Cushing. The "Mad Monk" is pretty good, too. The rest varies. You either liked historical shows or not. And it was more of an educational programme than a pure sci-fi romp. The show was made on a shoestring budget, but they seemed to have faired better than Troughton's era, in terms of sets.

What I liked about the first doctor's era is they did little to no retakes. So Hartnell's scrambling to remember the lines meant that he spoke with hesitation, or stutter steps. Knowing that he had the script written out on crib notes in the Tardis makes it fun as he frantically looks for one note, then the other... I sort of integrated his delivery into a speech pattern. That doctor sounded dotty..

Incidentally, Davison said he strongly modeled himself after Troughton and Hartnell. With most of the whimsy coming from Patrick. Davison, too, you felt could be killed at any moment.

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Middle Aged Crazy, like Uncle Terry

Holy cow is that a dead ringer for Barbara. Ian, not so much.



Also solid



Good hype for the 50th.