25 years ago almost to the very day I had myself a very enjoyable long weekend. After Jimmy White building up an almost unassailable lead of 14-8 against Stephen Hendry the young Scot reeled off ten frames in a row to win 18-14 in one of the greatest finals the sport had ever seen . A day later another miracle occurred when I popped in to my local Woolworths and bought a VHS copy of The Tomb Of The Cybermen a story thought lost forever and which was considered to be a masterwork of DOCTOR WHO. History has repeated itself in April 2017 neither as farce nor tragedy as I've been watching the world snooker championship and another DOCTOR WHO story that was considered a masterpiece and was thought lost forever - The Power Of The Daleks
Okay I've used a bit of artistic license because the story hasn't been returned to the BBC archives but has been reconstructed as animation while using the existing soundtrack dubbed over the animation . I'm somewhat sad that the previous commentator hasn't been too impressed with the animation but I have seen still pictures from the story and the physical recreation of the cast and sets is fairly accurate. In those days the sets were very basic and rudimentary. The only downside in watching this in animated form is that it's impossible to capture the inflexion and other metaphysical qualities that comes with great acting
Make no mistake Power contains great acting and superb writing. The Daleks had insured immortality for the show and the production team wanted to try something different with them so out goes Terry Nation who viewed his creations as Space Nazis and in comes the original script editor of the show David Whittaker who has written a very subtle story. What makes it so interesting is that it analyses human nature where many individuals couldn't care less about their fellow man and constantly purge and stab others in the back for their pursuit of power . The tile has a deliberately ironic subtext in that the story revolves around the dark side of human nature rather than the Daleks. Say what you like about the Daleks but at least in those stage of their evolution they're a cohesive race puzzled by the tribalistic self destructive actions of the humans
You also have to take on board this is how the show was produced in those days. If you're a fan due to the new show and have heard how brilliant this story is I can understand your disappointment with its lack of post modernism , snappy one liners and scope but as a hard core old school fan I found this hypnotic due to the drama and the increasingly brooding atmosphere helped greatly by the gloomy musical score resurrected from the Daleks debut story . The only downside I felt was that the Daleks themselves could be any alien one off robotic race while the animation can't really capture the performance of Robert James as Lesterson who becomes insane when he realises his scientific curiosity has doomed the colonists
All in all one of the greatest stories from DOCTOR WHO 1963-89 and one that didn't disappoint me in the slightest. Here's hoping the snooker final on Sunday and Monday will be just as good as the one from 1992
Okay I've used a bit of artistic license because the story hasn't been returned to the BBC archives but has been reconstructed as animation while using the existing soundtrack dubbed over the animation . I'm somewhat sad that the previous commentator hasn't been too impressed with the animation but I have seen still pictures from the story and the physical recreation of the cast and sets is fairly accurate. In those days the sets were very basic and rudimentary. The only downside in watching this in animated form is that it's impossible to capture the inflexion and other metaphysical qualities that comes with great acting
Make no mistake Power contains great acting and superb writing. The Daleks had insured immortality for the show and the production team wanted to try something different with them so out goes Terry Nation who viewed his creations as Space Nazis and in comes the original script editor of the show David Whittaker who has written a very subtle story. What makes it so interesting is that it analyses human nature where many individuals couldn't care less about their fellow man and constantly purge and stab others in the back for their pursuit of power . The tile has a deliberately ironic subtext in that the story revolves around the dark side of human nature rather than the Daleks. Say what you like about the Daleks but at least in those stage of their evolution they're a cohesive race puzzled by the tribalistic self destructive actions of the humans
You also have to take on board this is how the show was produced in those days. If you're a fan due to the new show and have heard how brilliant this story is I can understand your disappointment with its lack of post modernism , snappy one liners and scope but as a hard core old school fan I found this hypnotic due to the drama and the increasingly brooding atmosphere helped greatly by the gloomy musical score resurrected from the Daleks debut story . The only downside I felt was that the Daleks themselves could be any alien one off robotic race while the animation can't really capture the performance of Robert James as Lesterson who becomes insane when he realises his scientific curiosity has doomed the colonists
All in all one of the greatest stories from DOCTOR WHO 1963-89 and one that didn't disappoint me in the slightest. Here's hoping the snooker final on Sunday and Monday will be just as good as the one from 1992