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It's interesting to read about how Who fandom was during those years. I hadn't watched the series since the early '80s so I was oblivious to the program's fate until around 1996, when a colleague who was a fan kept me up to date as to what had happened. This may have been around the time of the TV movie.
How did you "survive" those dark, dank years, John?
Ah yes, The Dark Times. Lol.
Back in those days, it was good old VHS. BBC Video was releasing them at quite a rate. Also Virgin Books had started their range of books and of course the Doctor Who Magazine was around. Some of the highlights of this period was the colourised Daemons and finally getting to see Tomb of the Cybermen.
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My favorite Dr Who DVD bonus feature is "Cheques, Lies, and Videotape", where long time fans of the series humorously reminisce about their youthful attempts to procure Dr Who stories that were as-yet-unavailable during those wilderness years. It's on the Revenge of the Cybermen DVD, which I cannot for the life of me figure out exactly why fans voted for that story to be released on VHS first. I like it well enough, but I wouldn't want it *first*! lol
I'm afraid I probably fell into that group too. Years ago, I used to know someone on the DWAS committee and he used to lend me copies of the early stories. This was the first time I was able to see The War Games. Great way to spend a Sunday afternoon.
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My first season with a video recorder was Season 19, Peter Davison's first. Very annoying because it was ordered before the start of Castrovalva but didn't arrive until after episode 2!
My first copy of an old story was a second generation The Chase (the first story I have a memory of watching at the tender age of 4), but the worst picture quality one I ever got at the time, here in the UK, was a camera copy from Canada of The Sea Devils. It was so far down in generations it looked like a cartoon! And I was a proud owner!
Those certainly were the days...
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My first season with a video recorder was Season 19, Peter Davison's first. Very annoying because it was ordered before the start of Castrovalva but didn't arrive until after episode 2!
My first copy of an old story was a second generation The Chase (the first story I have a memory of watching at the tender age of 4), but the worst picture quality one I ever got at the time, here in the UK, was a camera copy from Canada of The Sea Devils. It was so far down in generations it looked like a cartoon! And I was a proud owner!
Those certainly were the days...
I remember getting a camera copy of The Daemons from a friend in America. The whole thing must have been about
10th generation. I could barely make out the faces, but just to see it and in colour (almost!). lol
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It's impossible to express how big a deal The Five Faces season was to DW fans. While we waited for the new Doctor, Peter Davison, we were treated to repeats of past Doctors! Of all the things John Nathan-Turner did for the fans, and he was regarded at this point as 'the fans' producer', this was one of the best. Until this it was a policy NEVER to show episodes from a previous Doctor to the current one, and even they were rare. We never had a series rerun. EVER.
Originally JNT wanted to include The Masque of Mandragora, a more appropriate story for Tom Baker, but it fell through. Logopolis was of course legitimate being the last story before the new series.
I didn't get access to that video recorder 'till halfway through Castrovalva, so in order to LISTEN to the old classics afterwards I had to make do with recording them onto audio cassette with a microphone!
Happy days.
You Americans had luxury with your shows lasting forever in syndication. Nothing ever died on American tv! And all the time the greatest ever sf/fantasy series was being junked by it's own corporation! Priceless tv history being erased forever by shortsighted executives not thinking of a future time when channels would be swallowing up material like there's no tomorrow. Neither were they thinking that one day these things would have a commercial future outside broadcasting.
You lot across the pond are so lucky. You don't know you're born!
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I think it was before it was announced that Pertwee was leaving that I saw a letter in Radio Times where someone asked if we could have the Cybermen back. The reply was that they were coming back in the next series. I was very excited at the prospect of my favourite Doctor having an adventure with them, but of course things turned out differently.
Even worse, after the thrill of seeing them at the end of Revenge Part 1, I was all set for watching them the following week when my dad announced he was taking us on a trip to a well known amusement park on that Saturday, so he could follow our home town brass band in concert! There I am sitting through a concert knowing I was missing the first Cybermen story in the best part of ten flippin' years! To rub salt in the woulds we went to see a side show that claimed to feature a living captured Yeti! It was some guy in very poorly disguised pyjamas, and definitely nothing to do with the Great Intelligence.
Yes, fans everywhere groaned at that first Revenge video cover. How could they?
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