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| What: | Orbis (Eighth Doctor Adventures audios) |
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| By: | Doug, Pocono Summit, PA, USA |
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| Date: | Tuesday 14 July 2009 |
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| Rating: |   7 |
Wasn't there another review or two here previously?
Well, anyway, first off, I still love, love, love the new/retro opening titles music that was first used with last season's Eighth Doctor and Lucie releases.
In Orbis, we get quite a bit of misdirection on the part of the "Headhunter" character, so all is really not what it seems here. I suppose it's easy to get frustrated by what at first appear to be inconsistencies, but listening all the way through reveals that a lot more is going on here than is apparent at first. This story is not as simple as it appears, nor is it really concluded as the closing theme music rolls.
Having said that, the bulk of the story concerns, um, big walking jellyfish and shellfish. Yah. The main baddie is almost like the ghost of Sil. The Doctor, it seems, got dumped here on Orbis for reasons that will be made clearer as you continue, and he's been here for a REALLY long time. For Lucie it's only been a few months, but for the Doctor, it's been... MUCH longer. As you can imagine, this presents some problems when the two meet again. It brings to mind a question. If we're to take all of this as proper within established Doctor Who canon, how was the First Doctor so aged if he was only 500 or so years old? The ideas in Orbis, though interesting, don't really square for me, but maybe this is yet more misdirection, the truth of which will be revealed later.
Orbis is definitely a strange way to resolve the previous season-end cliffhanger, but we'll just have to see what is done with it throughout the rest of this season. What I do *not* like about this so far is the downer of the Eighth Doctor's new 'tired of life' attitude, which hopefully will not last long...
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 | The Start of an Iconic Character |
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This is a brillant set An Unearthly Child is the first which is an amazing story. The Daleks is next and still as good. And last but not least is The Edge of Destruction which was and cheap but brillant production. Now u think that's it but it isn't on The Edge of Destruction DVD there it is a 30mins Recon of Marco Polo which a brillant way to bridge the gap to The Key to Marnius which is soon to be released
Patrick Troughton, the cosmic hobo and my fav doctor. The War Games is just the perfect story to describe pat's years. Fun, thoughtful and sometimes just silly.
I normanlly don't watch the special features but these were really good.
Pat's last story was the last in black and white.
And what a way to end his time in dr who.
So 3 discs, 10 episodes, 2 classic compainions and one brillant dr.
| What: | Deep Blue (BBC Past Doctor novels) |
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| By: | Trevor Smith, Nottingham, United Kingdom |
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| Date: | Saturday 11 July 2009 |
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| Rating: | 8 |
I was drawn to this book as I had met Mark Morris in Nottingham recently.
This is a really well written exciting book with a pleasing old time four parter with cliff hangers. The ending felt a bit rushed but other than that highly recommended.
| What: | The War Games (BBC classic series DVDs/Blu-rays) |
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| By: | Trevor Smith, Nottingham, United Kingdom |
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| Date: | Saturday 11 July 2009 |
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| Rating: | 10 |
In the unlikely event of me being invited onto a Dr Who "Desert Island Discs", This would definitely be one of the story's I would take with him. A story full of wit, invention & wonderful character's & a heartbreaking ending. The restoration is staggeringly good. The sound (& especially)the picture has to be seen to be believed. The extras are a wonderful treasure trove of goodies. I loved "Stripped for Action" wonderful memories of the 2nd Doctor comic strips in TV Comic, Cybermen on skis, wonderful.
If you only buy one Dr Who DVD this year, make it this one.
This release has 2 very good stories and the other, I would say turkey but I hate to insult poultry in such a manner:
TURN LEFT - A really good original idea for a story. Except it seems a little pointless as in the end, nothing really happens. However overall, one of the best RTD has written.
THE STOLEN EARTH/JOURNEY'S END - From the trailers for this story, it looks like the best yet. All the companions and the most famous villains of all, the DALEKS! WITH DAVROS! However this one takes a whole episode to get started and then cheats us on a regeneration, before finally ending about 30 minutes into the 2nd episode (this is the one that needed to go for 65 minutes because they couldn't fit it all into the regular timeslot. WHAT?). For the last 35 minutes it's all goodbyes and farewells. And why did the Doctor immediately say goodbye to Rose when he's been trying to get to her for the past 2 series. But at least we don't have to put up with more of Billie Piper. In short, complete rubbish.
| What: | 100 (Big Finish: The Monthly Adventures) |
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| By: | Jack, Auckland, NZ |
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| Date: | Friday 10 July 2009 |
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| Rating: | 10 |
Despite what others may say, each of these stories are brilliant. There's a lot of great humour from the first 2 stories, the third story, Bedtime Stories, is quite creepy and well told with a brilliant twist at the end. And finally the last story is not so much a story, but a very nice homage to the Big Finish range in general.
In short, this is one of the best audios ever produced by Big Finish.
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| The war to end all Doctor Whos... |
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| What: | The War Games (BBC classic series DVDs/Blu-rays) |
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| By: | Huw Davies, Taunton, United Kingdom |
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| Date: | Thursday 9 July 2009 |
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| Rating: | 10 |
This set is a triumph - by far the best yet. Whether the Guardian Trilogy and Keys of Marinus can live up to it remains to be seen, but they'll have to put up a fight, as this is a superb release.
The story itself is great: rolling along at a cracking pace, understandably for a 10-episoder it is almost guaranteed to sag in the middle. However this doesn't tarnish a wonderful story, as the final episode, which introduces the Time Lords, makes up for everything.
As for the extras, they have a whole disc to themselves, but 2|entertain haven't been unkind to us by cramming it full of super documentaries.
At £13.48 on Amazon, this release is the biggest bargain ever. Plus, watch Spearhead from Space afterwards - they form a nice little duo.
| What: | The Raincloud Man (Big Finish: The Monthly Adventures) |
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| By: | Doug, Pocono Summit, PA, USA |
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| Date: | Wednesday 8 July 2009 |
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| Rating: | 6 |
The Raincloud Man is one of those that I really kind of liked, but am not entirely sure why. The story elements are sort of loosely held together and we have a lot of rather mundane stuff here - a bit of police drama, city characters with fairly basic city accents and city personalities, and lots of heads being thumped. The listener must pay attention to keep a grip on what's happening - the script tends to not make things obvious or explain them very well. Detective Menzies isn't even properly introduced - we must simply know who this is from the previous story featuring her, The Condemned. As well, the situation with the casino ship wasn't made immediately obvious either.
In addition, it sure seems like there are quite a lot of aliens running around Manchester - sort of like a Men in Black takeoff. A bit over the top, it seemed.
Points in favor of the story would include the very interesting though sadly only briefly featured Kelsa, who is able to directly perceive time disturbances and anomalies, the reality-distorting house gaming system on the casino ship, and the Raincloud Man himself, though much more could have been made of him.
The Raincloud Man is definitely interesting enough to give a listen to... it just could've been put together a little better.
| What: | Timewyrm: Exodus (New Adventures novels) |
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| By: | Mark List, Midland, United States |
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| Date: | Wednesday 8 July 2009 |
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| Rating: | 8 |
This is a great follow up to the first book in the series.
This story was well written and easy to follow, even though it takes place in several different time periods.
Even though the Timewyrm wasn't a major player in this book it was an engaging story with well developed characters.
This story bounces us back to the strong partnership of a doctor in his element and the cheek and loud mouthed patter of a great companion. Orlok has fast pace, good one liners, monsters, castles villagers all wrapped up in classic gothic who.
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| The best new Doctor Who book but..! |
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Excellent book, of course, with the Dalek you need a good story to tell or you waste it all. It was written well enough, characters were great, I really like the setting in the Human Empire which permit space travel. The pacific Doctor is well written here, preventing even the suffering of a Dalek against intel of the ennemy. Several good parts of the book come to my mind when I think of it which never happened with the other Doctor Who books (except one).
The only major flaw in the book would be the incredible amount of stereotype sentences (allons-y, name and place dropping,...) the Doctor would say: this story don't really bring anything, it only resume what the Doctor is like. Otherwise, it's the only New Serie Doctor Who I would recommend for someone who don't watch the show.
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| Great, but repeating itself |
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There is a good story but it was spoiled by the continuing jump between the characters and the idea repeatating itself all over again in the whole story. We see very quickly the end coming.
On an other note: the zombie chasing the soldiers were simply too much (and the priest coming back to life: wayyyy! too much)...
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| I loved it, but I don't know why... |
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I really liked it (except for the end, the sound idea was great, but the burb not so...). The characters, especially the father, were very intersting to read about, their story, their background, what came out of it... I remember having a very good impression about it (writing, originality, the death of a character (not spoiling anyone),...)
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| Be careful what you wish for... |
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| What: | Wishing Well (BBC New Series Adventures novels) |
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| By: | 4nicolas2, Canada |
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| Date: | Tuesday 7 July 2009 |
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| Rating: | 7 |
Interesting piece of book, characters are generally nice but lots of them are simply too much of a caricature. The idea behind it is good, but the end is one of the worst of the serie so far: amazing powers for the Doctor could be great, but not when it only respond to a need to defeat an enemy (Doctor- oh! I remember now that I can do amazing thing with my mind, even defeating this enemy. Why didn't I think of it before in this book, it could had save some life?)
| What: | Snowglobe 7 (BBC New Series Adventures novels) |
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| By: | 4nicolas2, Canada |
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| Date: | Tuesday 7 July 2009 |
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| Rating: | 6 |
Well written, but the story itself is very poor: an alien who wakes up from the ice after several years (where did I see that before? hmmm...) while a virus is spreading... With no really interesting moment and a weird storyline where a certain species came to Earth and coexist pacifically with the human. Huh! It's only worth the price...
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| What Doctor Who always did well... |
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| What: | The War Games (BBC classic series DVDs/Blu-rays) |
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| By: | Matthew David Rabjohns, Bridgend, United Kingdom |
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| Date: | Tuesday 7 July 2009 |
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| Rating: | 10 |
Doctor Who always had its share of very long stories. But what they all have in common is how well they stand up and how well the story doesnt overly sag. The War Games is my favourite of all the Patrick Troughton stories. Patrick Troughton is at the top of his acting powers for a start, with sveral memorable moments littered hroughout this great story. The action is well maintained and actually never over repetitive. There are many great performances from the supporting cast too. 10 episodes may be a bit too much for some to watch in one go, but definitey not for me. This is Doctor Who at its best. And once again, the sets nd location work are all very well done, producing some realistic world war one scenery. And the costume design seems of a high standard too. And the last episode seems to me to be one of the best eary episodes in Doctor Who, where there is some quite nice scenes which prove that Doctor Who did always have its fair share of emotional moments. The goodbyes between the Doc and his friends are some of the best ever, better than the so caled best Jo Grant farewell in my book. This is Doctor who at its very best, long and brilliant!
| What: | The War Games (BBC classic series DVDs/Blu-rays) |
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| By: | Ben Rigsby, Witney, United Kingdom |
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| Date: | Monday 6 July 2009 |
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| Rating: | 10 |
A fantastic story & great dvd too!
| What: | The Green Death (BBC classic series DVDs/Blu-rays) |
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| By: | Huw Davies, Taunton, United Kingdom |
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| Date: | Sunday 5 July 2009 |
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| Rating: | 10 |
Despite the relatively low score given on this site, The Green Death is most definitely one of my favourite Pertwees - 6 episodes with none of the usual 4 & 5th episode lagging, plus a super story by the under-rated Robert Sloman. The monsters look effective (save the silly fly thing) and Jo has a fitting send-off. Brilliant.
| What: | Timewyrm: Genesys (New Adventures novels) |
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| By: | Mark List, Midland, United States |
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| Date: | Sunday 5 July 2009 |
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| Rating: | 6 |
I felt that this was only an OK novelization. It may be that it was the first novel not adapted from the television series, and I felt that John Peel tried to make it "too adult" by his continual references to En-Gula's bare breasts and Gilgameshs sexual desires. Neither had any real relevence to the story. This may have been done to break the mold of the televised show, I don't really know. Gilgamesh was a freaking idiot in the book and I had no love/compassion for the character. I could have cared less if he would have gotten offed.
I think that the Timewyrm could develop into a great nemisis for the Doctor and it will be interesting to see how the next 3 authors continue the series.
I felt it was decent and worth reading, but I have read much better novels.
