a disused yeti?!
Tuesday, 25 February 2014 12:03![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
usuallyhats
On Saturday I went to a marathon screening of The Enemy of the World amd The Web of Fear, neither of which I'd seen before outside of recons. The screening was in London, so I had to get up BEFORE 7AM to get there (no, I am never going to stop moaning about this, my natural hours of sleep are 2am-10am so losing my Saturday lie-in is a big deal), but it was absolutely worth it: it was a really great way to see the episodes for the first time. (I can neither confirm or deny that I got a tiny bit emotional as Enemy of the World part one started. I LOVE DOCTOR WHO SO MUCH.)
Both stories looked AMAZING on the big screen and I thoroughly enjoyed them both. Recons can't really compare (as became obvious with Web of Fear episode three, though to be fair the BBC's recon wasn't as good as some recons I've seen). Enemy of the World is definitely the stronger story, partly because The Web of Fear is essentially a base under siege story, albeit a pretty good one. Web of Fear falls down a bit by having slightly too many named secondary characters, I thought: their deaths didn't quite mean as much as I think the story wanted them too. Also Victoria doesn't come off very well: there's nothing wrong with a female character screaming and being scared, of course, but it's a shame she didn't really have anything more to do on top of that. She does much better in Enemy of the World, where yes, she's scared, but she has some lovely moments of defiance too, when pushed far enough: snapping "Don't shout at me" at Bruce, attacking the Doctor when she think's he's Salamander, and generally getting to do plot-relevant stuff too. The Web of Fear does do really well at claustrophobia, though, with the good guys getting trapped in a gradually-decreasing section of the underground, and has some excellent secondary characters: Professor Travers is hugely dynamic and fun (and having Team TARDIS run into someone they've met before is always great; I don't remember this happening before, but I may be wrong), it was great to see the Brig before he was the Brig, and Anne Travers was marvellous. She was cool, intelligent, amused, scared sometimes but not incapacitated by her fear, and generally great. I also liked the fact that there was a definite difference between the way the soldiers treated her (as a woman who does science) and the way the Doctor treated her (just as a scientist). The sets are, of course, fantastic. I really liked the one used for the story's denoument, which, obviously, I hadn't seen before.
The Enemy of the World has a much more interesting plot, I thought: I had totally forgotten about the twist! I also enjoyed the variety of villains: Salamander's mwahaha-ing, Benik's cool pleasure in being wicked, and Bruce as a basically lawful man badly led. It also had some great women in Astrid and Fariah (so sad she got killed off, especially given that a black woman having such a good part is still sadly all too rare, but her death scene was pretty great), and even Mary had her moments. (She was the best of the underground lot, though, who were mostly a bit wet.) The opening, with the Doctor playing on the beach, was delightful and hilarious, but managed the change in tone when they suddenly need to run for their lives excellently. ♥ Griffin the cook was also hilarious: it was great to have someone to break the tension every now and then. And Patrick Troughton was of course tremendous fun in his dual role. (It was hard to tell for sure but I think they might have darkened his skin for it, though, which I wish they hadn't. :/ I mean, the Doctor doesn't seem to put on any make-up the first time he impersonates Salamander, and still manages to fool Bruce, who presumably sees a lot of him, but it looked like he had later on. D:)
I was also pleased to see that both stories had lots and lots of gratuitous clinging and hand holding for Two, Jamie and Victoria. THAT'S WHAT I LIKE TO SEE.
The screening was followed by a fun Q&A with Frazer Hines, Deborah Watling, Michael Troughton and Ralph Watson (who played Captain Knight in The Web of Fear), moderated by Tony Hadoke. Also, it turned out that in the audience was someone who'd been a junior camera operator on The Web of Fear, and Tony Hadoke, being Tony Hadoke, had realised who he was and asked him to tell us what he remembered about the production. He talked about how they'd had to put the camera at an angle to film the opening scenes of Our Heroes falling out of the TARDIS (which was almost as tricky as putting the entire set on an angle...), and explained that the web had been made out of strands of Airfix glue sprinkled with talcum powder to make it show up! Everyone praised the Web of Fear sets, and someone (possibly Frazer Hines?) pointed out that the tube stations were all the same set with different signs up, which seems obvious now it's pointed out but hadn't really occurred to me as I was watching - they did a great job of selling all the stations as different locations.
Frazer Hines claimed that the first he'd heard of the return of these stories was when Deborah Watling phoned to say she'd see him at the screening! She said that she'd forgotten that her father was in Web of Fear until she actually saw him on screen. ("I grabbed Frazer and said 'That's my father!'. 'I know,' he said.") They all talked about how much they'd liked Jack Watling, and how much fun they all had making Doctor Who. ♥
Someone asked the panel which other missing stories they'd like to see back. Deborah Watling wants Fury From The Deep, because Victoria got to defeat the monster! Frazer Hines wants The Highlanders, and Michael Troughton thought that it would be good to see his father's performance in one of his earlier stories, like that one. He also talked about how dedicated his father had been to the idea of Doctor Who as being for children, and reminisced about visiting the Web of Fear set for an episode.
There was a lot of other stuff that I have forgotten, because my memory is a sieve. /o\ Oh, though someone (Hadoke?) did say that they'd intended to have lots more stuff with Salamander and the Doctor interacting in Enemy of the World, but hadn't been able to get the studio time. WOE.
Both stories looked AMAZING on the big screen and I thoroughly enjoyed them both. Recons can't really compare (as became obvious with Web of Fear episode three, though to be fair the BBC's recon wasn't as good as some recons I've seen). Enemy of the World is definitely the stronger story, partly because The Web of Fear is essentially a base under siege story, albeit a pretty good one. Web of Fear falls down a bit by having slightly too many named secondary characters, I thought: their deaths didn't quite mean as much as I think the story wanted them too. Also Victoria doesn't come off very well: there's nothing wrong with a female character screaming and being scared, of course, but it's a shame she didn't really have anything more to do on top of that. She does much better in Enemy of the World, where yes, she's scared, but she has some lovely moments of defiance too, when pushed far enough: snapping "Don't shout at me" at Bruce, attacking the Doctor when she think's he's Salamander, and generally getting to do plot-relevant stuff too. The Web of Fear does do really well at claustrophobia, though, with the good guys getting trapped in a gradually-decreasing section of the underground, and has some excellent secondary characters: Professor Travers is hugely dynamic and fun (and having Team TARDIS run into someone they've met before is always great; I don't remember this happening before, but I may be wrong), it was great to see the Brig before he was the Brig, and Anne Travers was marvellous. She was cool, intelligent, amused, scared sometimes but not incapacitated by her fear, and generally great. I also liked the fact that there was a definite difference between the way the soldiers treated her (as a woman who does science) and the way the Doctor treated her (just as a scientist). The sets are, of course, fantastic. I really liked the one used for the story's denoument, which, obviously, I hadn't seen before.
The Enemy of the World has a much more interesting plot, I thought: I had totally forgotten about the twist! I also enjoyed the variety of villains: Salamander's mwahaha-ing, Benik's cool pleasure in being wicked, and Bruce as a basically lawful man badly led. It also had some great women in Astrid and Fariah (so sad she got killed off, especially given that a black woman having such a good part is still sadly all too rare, but her death scene was pretty great), and even Mary had her moments. (She was the best of the underground lot, though, who were mostly a bit wet.) The opening, with the Doctor playing on the beach, was delightful and hilarious, but managed the change in tone when they suddenly need to run for their lives excellently. ♥ Griffin the cook was also hilarious: it was great to have someone to break the tension every now and then. And Patrick Troughton was of course tremendous fun in his dual role. (It was hard to tell for sure but I think they might have darkened his skin for it, though, which I wish they hadn't. :/ I mean, the Doctor doesn't seem to put on any make-up the first time he impersonates Salamander, and still manages to fool Bruce, who presumably sees a lot of him, but it looked like he had later on. D:)
I was also pleased to see that both stories had lots and lots of gratuitous clinging and hand holding for Two, Jamie and Victoria. THAT'S WHAT I LIKE TO SEE.
The screening was followed by a fun Q&A with Frazer Hines, Deborah Watling, Michael Troughton and Ralph Watson (who played Captain Knight in The Web of Fear), moderated by Tony Hadoke. Also, it turned out that in the audience was someone who'd been a junior camera operator on The Web of Fear, and Tony Hadoke, being Tony Hadoke, had realised who he was and asked him to tell us what he remembered about the production. He talked about how they'd had to put the camera at an angle to film the opening scenes of Our Heroes falling out of the TARDIS (which was almost as tricky as putting the entire set on an angle...), and explained that the web had been made out of strands of Airfix glue sprinkled with talcum powder to make it show up! Everyone praised the Web of Fear sets, and someone (possibly Frazer Hines?) pointed out that the tube stations were all the same set with different signs up, which seems obvious now it's pointed out but hadn't really occurred to me as I was watching - they did a great job of selling all the stations as different locations.
Frazer Hines claimed that the first he'd heard of the return of these stories was when Deborah Watling phoned to say she'd see him at the screening! She said that she'd forgotten that her father was in Web of Fear until she actually saw him on screen. ("I grabbed Frazer and said 'That's my father!'. 'I know,' he said.") They all talked about how much they'd liked Jack Watling, and how much fun they all had making Doctor Who. ♥
Someone asked the panel which other missing stories they'd like to see back. Deborah Watling wants Fury From The Deep, because Victoria got to defeat the monster! Frazer Hines wants The Highlanders, and Michael Troughton thought that it would be good to see his father's performance in one of his earlier stories, like that one. He also talked about how dedicated his father had been to the idea of Doctor Who as being for children, and reminisced about visiting the Web of Fear set for an episode.
There was a lot of other stuff that I have forgotten, because my memory is a sieve. /o\ Oh, though someone (Hadoke?) did say that they'd intended to have lots more stuff with Salamander and the Doctor interacting in Enemy of the World, but hadn't been able to get the studio time. WOE.
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no subject
Date: 25 Feb 2014 14:46 (UTC)no subject
Date: 27 Feb 2014 11:33 (UTC)no subject
Date: 25 Feb 2014 22:21 (UTC)And yes, they did darken Patrick Troughtan's skin - you can see Astrid painting the makeup on him at the end of part 4.
I'm glad you had a lovely time. :)
no subject
Date: 27 Feb 2014 11:35 (UTC)Oh yes, I remember that bit now. :(
no subject
Date: 25 Feb 2014 23:51 (UTC)I've been looking forward to seeing these, but I don't think "Enemy of the World" has a Region 1 release date nailed down yet. :(
no subject
Date: 27 Feb 2014 11:36 (UTC)Argh, how frustrating! I've been holding off on buying them due to the lack of extras, but I least I know I could if I wanted to...
no subject
Date: 21 Apr 2014 00:47 (UTC)no subject
Date: 23 Apr 2014 10:33 (UTC)