This week, Brendan, Richard and Nathan tackle City of Death, by Douglas Adams and Graham Williams. How many superlatives can fit in a single 40-minute podcast episode?
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City of Death was released on DVD in 2005. Seriously, if you don’t have a copy, just buy it. At once. (Amazon US) (Amazon UK)
Notes and links
We’ve uploaded some photos from Brendan’s Facebook album Toys on Tour, which is the best place to go to see a plastic Tom Baker crawling up the gate to the Galerie Denise René in Paris.
When she wasn’t busy helping her husband to steal the Mona Lisa, Catherine Schell appeared in the second season of Space: 1999 as Maya, a shape-changing alien from the planet Psychon. It’s really much worse than you could possibly imagine.
For two years, from 1911 to 1913, the Mona Lisa was no longer in the Louvre: it was hidden in a trunk in Vincenzo Peruggia’s apartment after he entered the Louvre, hid it under his smock and made off with it. See, we’re educational as well as entertaining.
Captain Tancredi’s bodyguard is played by Peter Halliday, who won our hearts in his role as Packer in The Invasion.
Romana’s naughty schoolgirl outfit seems to be inspired by the St Trinian’s film series in the 50s and 60s. Another inspiration might be Madeline, the heroine of a series of children’s books written by Austrian author Ludwig Bemelmans in the 1950s and 60s.
Licence Denied was a collection of fan writing edited by Paul Cornell and first published in 1997. It is, sadly, out of print. Notable essays include Tom the Second, Gareth Roberts’s defence of the Williams Era, and Why the Nimon Should Be Our Friends, by Phillip J. Gray. And no, you can’t borrow my copy.
James Goss’s novelisation of City of Death was released by BBC Books in 2015. It’s good. Buy it. (Amazon US) (Amazon UK)
Comic Book Guy kidnaps Lucy Lawless in The Simpsons Halloween episode Treehouse of Horror X. Hilariously, the Simpsons Wikia page warns that “this episode is considered non-canon and the events featured do not relate to the series and therefore may not have actually happened/existed”. Which is nice to know.
It’s the start of an exciting new season of Doctor Who. Terry Nation’s back and Mary Tamm isn’t, but we still manage to pull ourselves together long enough to discuss Destiny of the Daleks.
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Destiny of the Daleks was released on DVD in 2007/2008. That was simple. (Amazon US) (Amazon UK)
Notes and links
In 1980, Tom and Lalla recorded a series of Australian ads for minicomputer company Prime Computer. These are available as a DVD extra on the Destiny DVD, but you can also see them on YouTube.
In 1979, Tom recorded a series of three ads for conservation group Keep Australia Beautiful. You can see a terrible videotape copy of two of these on YouTube as well.
The nightmarish scenario of wars run by computer will later be taken up by Matthew Broderick in War Games (1983), which you are all too young to remember. Damn you.
Star Trek’s Wil Wheaton interviews Doctor Who’s Jenna Coleman and Peter Capaldi on the Series 9 DVD and Blu-ray releases. You can watch some short excerpts from that interview here and here.
Chaos on the Bridge is a 2014 documentary written and produced by William Shatner, chronicling the first few difficult years of Star Trek: The Next Generation. It’s available on Netflix. (Not any longer, apparently.)
Mark Michalowski’s short story The Lying Old Witch in the Wardrobe was published in 2003 as part of Big Finish’s anthology Short Trips: Companions. It explains — whimsically — why Romana regenerates at the start of this story, and suggests that the Romana we see here is not exactly who we expect her to be.
The impasse faced by two perfectly logical computer opponents is an outworking of game theory, used by mathematician John von Neumann to model, among other things, the interactions between the US and the USSR in the Cold War.
The same impasse is also the basis of the short story Fool’s Mate, first published in Astounding Science Fiction in March 1953. In this story, two computerised battle fleets are frozen, unable to attack one another, until one decides to put its attack strategy under the control of a complete madman. Which just goes to show, really.
It’s the final story of the Key to Time season, whose story wheezes and groans to a halt in The Armageddon Factor. Meanwhile, Brendan, Nathan and Todd have a lovely time praising Mary, dissing everything else, and answering that pressing question: what did we think of Doctor Who’s first ever season-long arc?
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And now, for the last time: In the US, you can buy The Armageddon Factor by itself (Amazon US), or as part of the Key to Time box set (Amazon US). In the UK, it’s only available as part of the Key to Time box set. (Amazon UK)
Notes and links
We’ve referred to Cornell, Day and Topping’s The Discontinuity Guide before. It’s out of print, buy you can still buy for your Kindle (Amazon US) (Amazon UK) (Amazon AU). The text of the book is reproduced on the old BBC Cult Doctor Who website, which is pretty hard to get to these days, but I have at least managed to find their take on The Armageddon Factor (“the whole thing is very uninvolving”).
Davyd Harries, who plays posh idiot sidekick Shapp, is also fairly horrifying as Vila’s hilarious bluebeard pal Doran in the horrifying Blakes 7 episode Moloch, written by Blakes 7’s resident horrifying misogynist Ben Steed.
Fans of the entire contents of the Bristol Boys’ kitchen drawers will enjoy Dave Martin’s entry in the Make Your Own Adventure series, Search for the Doctor, which features the Sixth Doctor, K9, Drax and Omega.
Picks of the Week
Brendan
This week, Brendan has decided not to pick the Big FinishThe Key 2 Time series, which consists of The Judgement of Isskar, The Destroyer of Delights and The Chaos Pool, and stars Peter Davison as the Doctor. He has also decided not to pick Graceless, an entire Big Finish series which serves as a sequel to The Key 2 Time, and which has now run for three whole series.
Instead, he’s picked The Auntie Matter, a Big Finish full-cast audio drama starring Tom Baker and Mary Tamm.
Nathan has picked The AV Club, which is a sister site to satirical newspaper The Onion, and is the home of some of the best writing on pop culture on the internet. He particularly recommends the reviews of the Classic Series written by Christopher Bahn.
We’re also on Facebook, and you can check out our website at flightthroughentirety.com. And please consider rating or reviewing us on iTunes, because if you’re not rating or reviewing us on iTunes, we can make you rate or review us on iTunes, because we can do anything! As from this moment there’s no such thing as free will in the entire universe! For we possess the Key to Time!
In this fart-astic episode of Flight Through Entirety, our search for the fifth segment of the Key to Time takes us to the third moon of Delta Magna where we confront The Power of Kroll.
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Same as last time, really: In the US, you can buy The Power of Kroll by itself (Amazon US), or as part of the Key to Time box set (Amazon US). In the UK, it’s only available as part of the Key to Time box set. (Amazon UK)
Notes and links
Not many links this week. (There’s an appalling dearth of references to German Expressionism in our discussion.) So to pass the time while listening to this episode, why not read a review of The Power of Kroll from the AV Club website? And for once, there’s no need to avoid the comments thread.
This is Philip Madoc’s last performance in Doctor Who. He passed away in 2012. You can read his obituary in The Guardian.
Todd is puzzled by the idea of feeding Krollfarts to the hapless population of Delta Magna. What he didn’t know was that bacteria actually can be used to convert methane to proteins. Fact fans will enjoy this article on the topic.
We’re also on Facebook, and you can check out our website at flightthroughentirety.com. And please consider rating or reviewing us on iTunes, or we’ll send you a hundred tons of compressed protein a day — a fifth of your protein requirements. And you know were we’ll be getting it from!
If there was ever any doubt that Brendan is a young man of exceptional taste and discernment, this episode finally lays it to rest with the revelation that his favourite Doctor Who story ever is The Androids of Tara!
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You know the drill by now: In the US, you can buy The Androids of Tara by itself (Amazon US), or as part of the Key to Time box set (Amazon US). In the UK, it’s only available as part of the Key to Time box set. (Amazon UK)
Notes and links
Famously, The Androids of Tara is shamelessly ripped off a loving tribute to Anthony Hope’s popular 1894 novel The Prisoner of Zenda. You can read it here.
We’ve mentioned the fanzine Cottage Under Siege before: it was edited by Neil Corry and Gareth Roberts and published in 1993–1994. Again, please, please, please contact us if you know where we can get copies of it.
You can read the summery and charming discussion of The Androids of Tara from Cornell, Day and Topping’s The Discontinuity Guide at the old BBC Cult website.
Cousins to the Taran wood beast, the Links in the Blakes 7 episode Terminal held a terrible secret to the future of all of mankind. While looking amazingly silly.
Fans of Peter Jeffrey’s Count Grendel of Gracht will also enjoy his turn as a villain in the Avengers episode, Game.
Declan Mulholland, who plays Till in The Androids of Tara played a humanoid Jabba the Hutt in a deleted scene from the original Star Wars (1977).
This week, we’re back on Earth, being menaced by giant glowing fibreglass rocks. Incidentally, we’re also discussing the third story in the Key to Time season, The Stones of Blood.
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In the US, you can buy The Stones of Blood by itself (Amazon US), or as part of the Key to Time box set (Amazon US). In the UK, it’s only available as part of the Key to Time box set. (Amazon UK)
Notes and links
For the first time ever, Brendan was wrong about something. When auditioning to replace the divine Miss Rigg in The Avengers, Susan Engel didn’t act against Moray Laing, the current editor of Doctor Who Adventures magazine. It was actually Moray Watson, who played Sir Robert Muir in Black Orchid.
Evelyn Smythe was one of the Sixth Doctor’s companions in the main Big Finish series of Doctor Who audios.
And in other things that Nathan is wrong about, Gareth Roberts’s comic strip about sentient sand that attacks people was actually written by Paul Cornell and called Seaside Rendezvous, published in DWM’s 1991 Summer Special.
We’re also on Facebook, and you can check out our website at flightthroughentirety.com. And please consider rating or reviewing us on iTunes, or, like typical males, we’ll strand you here in the middle of nowhere with two complete strangers while we go off somewhere enjoying ourselves.
By the left frontal lobe of the Sky Demon, it’s a new golden age, and we’re off to Calufrax to confront The Pirate Planet.
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In the US, you can buy The Pirate Planet by itself (Amazon US), or as part of a box set (Amazon US). In the UK, it’s only available as part of the Key to Time box set. (Amazon UK)
Notes and links
Those young people on Todd’s lawn who don’t know who Leo Sayer is should totally watch this video.
Rotating knives are an important element of any modern architectural design, as this Monty Python sketch demonstrates.
If you’ve never heard Douglas Adams’s Hitchhikers’ Guide to the Galaxy radio series, then you should have a word with yourself immediately. (Audible US) (Audible UK) (Audible AU)
Unlike Nathan and Todd, Brendan had a spectacular career as an extra on the Australian TV series, Rescue Special Ops in 2009.
It’s the start of a new season, and Brendan, Nathan and Todd are sent on a mission from God to find six hidden podcast episodes, that, when assembled, form hours and hours of tiresome commentary on Season 16 of Doctor Who. First stop: The Ribos Operation.
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Okay, this one’s complicated. In 2002, The Ribos Operation was released on DVD exclusively in the US both individually and as part of a Key to Time box set. In 2007, there was a limited edition box set released in the UK and Australia, which was then released more generally in 2009. You can read all about that on the Wikipedia page, if you’re interested. The upshot of all this is that in the US you can buy The Ribos Operation by itself (Amazon US) or as part of a box set (Amazon US). In the UK, it’s only available as part of a box set. (Amazon UK)
Notes and links
Ian Marter’s novelisation of this story is available as an audiobook read by John Leeson. (Audible US) (Audible UK) (Audible AU)
Here is a Season 16 publicity photo of Mary and Tom with a giant sticking plaster on his lip after Paul Seed’s dog bit his face.
As Season 15 limps towards its inevitable conclusion, we discover a new trope, reflect on the possibilities of Sevateem–Gallifreyan romance, and deplore the indefensible cruelty of horse racing: it’s The Invasion of Time!
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The Invasion of Time was released on DVD in 2008. (Amazon US) (Amazon UK). It was also released in Australia and the UK as part of the Bred for War box set, along with the other Classic Series Sontaran stories. (Amazon UK)
Notes and links
The Vardans appear to share a stylist with the Ultraman Science Patrol. No, I don’t know who they are either.
Gallifreyan hippy Presta is played by Gai Waterhouse, a famously wealthy Sydney horse trainer.
Gallifrey is a Big Finish audio series chronicling political intrigue on the Doctor’s home planet, featuring Mary Tamm, Lalla Ward and Louise Jameson, among others.
Green Wing was a Channel 4 comedy series set in a hospital, starring Doctor Who’s very own Tamsin Grieg and Michelle Gomez.
Underworld just might be the worst Doctor Who story of the 1970s, which is why we spend this episode discussing Hellenistic epic, orgies in Diana Dors’s house, and the reason why you might choose to wear a bag on your head. Enjoy!
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Underworld was released on DVD in 2010. In the US, it was released on its own (Amazon US), while in the UK and Australia it was part of the rightfully unloved Myths and Legends box set. (Amazon UK)
Notes and links
Fans of things with real literary merit — unlike Underworld — will enjoy the Argonautica by Apollonius of Rhodes, which tells the story of the quest for the Golden Fleece and the romance between Jason and Medea.
Fans of things that are interesting — unlike Underworld — will enjoy this lurid account in the Daily Mail of the orgies that went on in the home of British film star Diana Dors, as told by her son Jason Dors-Lake.
Fans of things that are crap but enjoyable — unlike Underworld — will enjoy these high-concept traditional SF series: the Foundation series by Isaac Asimov, and the Lensman series by E. E. “Doc” Smith. (The Foundation series is discussed in a recent episode of the brilliant nerd-culture podcast The Incomparable.)
Fans of amusing and inventive science fiction — you know what I’m going to say next — will enjoy Bea Arthur as the fem-puter in the 2001 Futurama episode Amazon Women in the Mood.
This week, we head off into the far future of the distant planet Pluto (yes, we know, shut up), to liberate humanity from the Company, in The Sun Makers. Hey Cordo, don’t bogart the pentocyleinicmethylhydrane, man.
William Simons, who plays sub-Blakean rebel leader Mandrell in this story, is more famous for his role in ITV period police drama series Heartbeat, playing Alf Ventress.
The Company takes Marx’s phrase “opiate of the masses” quite literally, drugging its oppressed population to keep them compliant. The Federation will adopt a similar tactic in Season 4 of Blakes 7, using the drug Pylene 50.
Richard points out the similarities between this story and The Space Merchants, a 1952 novel by Frederik Pohl and Cyril M. Kornbluth. It’s still in print. (Amazon US) (Amazon UK)
Richard also points out the story’s many visual references to Fritz Lang’s Metropolis (1927).
Brendan, Richard and Nathan are menaced, drugged and tied up, which means it’s either a normal Saturday night or the rather spectacular Image of the Fendahl.
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Image of the Fendahl was released on DVD in 2009. (Amazon US) (Amazon UK)
Notes and links
Ma Tyler is played by Daphne Heard, who was Peter Bowles’s mother Mrs Polouvicka in 70s/80s sitcom To The Manor Born. Here’s the first episode.
We’ve mentioned him before, but H. P. Lovecraft was a twentieth-century racist and horror writer, who popularised the idea that the world is hideously haunted by nightmarish creatures from beyond the dawn of time. His most famous short story is The Call of Cthulhu.
Fans of nightmarish creatures from beyond the dawn of time will enjoy Quatermass and the Pit, a BBC television programme from 1959 featuring, um, nightmarish creatures from beyond the dawn of time.
The Stone Tape was a 1972 television play by the author of Quatermass, about, you know, totally scary things. It’s available on YouTube. You can also find a recent radio version, starring the lovely Jane Asher, here.
Sapphire and Steel was a crazily fascinating and boring ITV science fiction series from the 1970s and 80s, starring Joanna Lumley and David McCallum. And, of course, there’s a Big Finish version of the series, but it can’t be found anywhere on their website for rights reasons, probably.
Should we mock the 70s? Do let’s. Here’s a link to the website of Erich von Däniken, who believed that human culture was totally influenced by aliens.
And while we’re mocking the 70s, you might enjoy Desmond Morris’s The Naked Ape and Manwatching.
Survivors is a hilarious 1970s TV series, written by Terry Nation, in which a horrible plague wipes out everyone except Dennis Lill, his moustache, and a small number of other middle class people. But at least Patrick Troughton is in an episode.
The terribly handsome actor who plays Stael in this story also plays Carnell in the Blakes 7 episode Weapon. He goes on to reprise his role in a totally-not-Big-Finish series of audio dramas by Magic Bullet Productions.
We’re also on Facebook, and you can check out our website at flightthroughentirety.com. And please consider rating or reviewing us on iTunes, or we’ll make you a fruit cake by throwing in the apple cores very hard, putting the lot in a shallow tin and baking in a high oven for two weeks.
This week, Brendan, Nathan and Richard enjoy the worst prawn cocktail of the entire 1970s: it’s The Invisible Enemy.
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The Invisible Enemy was released on DVD in 2008 as part of the K9 Tales box set, which also includes the execrable 1981 Christmas spin-off K9 and Company. (Amazon US) (Amazon UK).
Notes and links
We’re still in the middle of Doctor Who’s Blakes 7 years, and so the terrible cardboard corridor they fly down in Part 1 looks like an extremely low-rent version of the already fairly low-rent Xenon Base in Blakes 7 Season 4.
Roger Dean is an artist famous for his 70s prog-rock album covers, particularly for the band Yes. The picture Richard mentions is the cover of a Lighthouse album called One Fine Day. You can enjoy more of Dean’s work on his website, including images he used as evidence when he sued James Cameron for (allegedly) shamelessly ripping him off in Avatar.
As always, the world is ending, even in the 1970s, and so it’s time to mention Paul Ehrlich’s The Population Bomb, as well that indispensible condiment Soylent Green (1973).
Well, we should have listened to Mrs Nethercott, really. Yet another story that we all love: the Graham Williams era kicks off with a spectacular Edwardian Base Under Siege™ — it’s Horror of Fang Rock!
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Horror of Fang Rock was released on DVD way back in 2005. So, no, you can’t borrow my copy. (Amazon US) (Amazon UK)
Notes and links
Richard’s here this week, but despite that, we don’t make many fabulously obscure references to British television from the 1960s and 70s. (Apart from the obligatory references to The Prisoner and Are You Being Served?, of course.)
Here’s the BBC miniseries Count Dracula (1977), which put paid to Terrance Dicks’s original script, The Vampire Mutations, more of which later. It manages to be both tiresome and terrible, apparently. You can even buy it, if you feel you have to. (Amazon US) (Amazon UK)
Fans of television programmes that make you long for a Rutan to join the cast and massacre all the regulars will enjoy When the Boat Comes In, a BBC television series that ran from 1976 to 1981.
While the entire world goes crazy over what might be Daniel Craig’s final outing as Bond (sob!), why not re-visit a much worse Bond film — Thunderball (1965)? We’ll all be donning wetsuits and recording our first underwater commentary next week, and releasing it the following weekend. In the meantime, you can enjoy our existing commentary tracks, Goldfinger (1964), From Russia With Love (1963), and Dr. No (1962). You can keep up with all the Bondfinger news on our website, as well as on Twitter and Facebook.
Episode 50: The Practical Problem with Leaving Someone Alive
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This week, we risk the goodwill of our entire audience by spending the first 18 minutes of the episode discussing the appalling racism of fan favourite The Talons of Weng-Chiang. After that, Brendan and Todd talk about how great the story is, while Nathan just says Do you know what I mean? over and over again.
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The Talons of Weng-Chiang was released on DVD as a Special Edition in 2010/2011. (Amazon US) (Amazon UK)
Notes and links
You can buy The Doctor Who Discontinuity Guide as an ebook on Amazon (Amazon US) (Amazon UK). You can find most of the content for free (you cheapskate) by following the links from the Fourth Doctor page on the archived BBC Doctor Who website. We diss it this episode, but it’s actually really great.
Less great is Doctor Who: The Television Companion, by Howe and Walker. (Amazon US) (Amazon UK)
Fans of completely ruining the Sontarans, who are totally a credible and interesting threat, will enjoy the upcoming Big Finish series Jago and Litefoot and Strax. The first episode will be out in November.
Henry Higgins and Colonel Pickering go off to buy a dress for Audrey Hepburn in My Fair Lady (1964).
The simple analogy from Star Trek is fabulously referenced in the Futurama episode Where No Fan Has Gone Before.
Fans of Joanna Lumley and ludicrous giant rats will enjoy the New Avengers episode Gnaws.
Picks of the week
Todd
This week, Todd recommends the Big Finish Jago & Litefoot series, which has been going on for, like, 9 years. The delightful Pamela Salem returns in _Counter-Measures_, but, frankly, she’s more glamorous than they deserve.
Foe from the Future is a Big Finish audio that, in a nearby parallel universe, might have replaced The Talons of Weng-Chiang.
Nathan
Well, Nathan got nearly everthing wrong about his pick. You can find the Blakes 7 podcast Down and Safe here. They release a new episode every fortnight, or every two weeks if you come from the United States.
Pamela Salem is a goddess and The Robots of Death is just brilliant. Is there anything more to say here?
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The Robots of Death was the first proper Doctor Who DVD release way back in 2000/2001. Does that make you feel old? The Special Edition was released in 2012 as part of the Revisitations 3 box set in Australia and the UK, and individually in the US. (Amazon US) (Amazon UK)
Notes and links
Sapphire and Steel was an amazingly weird and almost unwatchably slow ITV series starring time agents Joanna Lumley and David McCallum as Sapphire and Steel respectively. David Collings, who played Poul in this story, occasionally guested as Silver.
Well, these are Doctor Who’s Blake’s 7 years, so here goes. Chris Boucher, who wrote this story, was the script editor of Blake’s 7, and went on to write lots of fabulously bitchy dialog over Blake’s 7’s four seasons. Borg is played by Brian Croucher, who played Travis in Blake’s 7 Season 2, and Miles Fothergill, who played camp newsreader robot SV7, played some guy in the Blake’s 7 episode The Web.
Fans of doing your hair and makeup in preparation for your big villain moment will enjoy Cancer in the Blake’s 7 Season 4 episode Assassin.
This week, Flight Through Entirety is conducting a weird experiment in eugenics to create the perfect race of Doctor Who podcasters. And so Brendan’s fake tan is orange, Nathan is wearing turquoise nappies and Todd’s face has been carved into the side of a mountain. That’s right, it’s time for The Face of Evil.
Where has the magic of Doctor Who gone? It’s the first time we’ve been back to Gallifrey since the last time, Todd is cross, and Mary Whitehouse is furious. It’s time for The Deadly Assassin!
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The Deadly Assassin was released on DVD in 2009. (Amazon US) (Amazon UK)
Notes and links
It’s impossible to understand the negative fanboy reception of this story without reading Jan Vincent-Rudski’s review of this story. There’s a video version of this review on YouTube.
You can find Jan Vincent-Rudski’s review in License Denied, edited by Paul Cornell, which is well worth a look. It includes Gareth Roberts’s defence of the Graham Williams Era, which Nathan thinks is utterly brilliant, of course.
The Manchurian Candidate (1962) tells the story of someone brainwashed into committing a terrible political assassination. Which really has nothing to do with The Deadly Assassin.
We’re also on Facebook, and you can check out our website at flightthroughentirety.com. And please consider rating or reviewing us on iTunes, or we’ll stick you in a Doctor Who story with no companion apart from a talking cabbage perched on your shoulder. Which would just serve you right.
Bondfinger
We recorded our commentary podcast episode for Goldfinger mere moments ago, so keep an eye out for its release in the next week or so on Bondfinger. We have already done two commentaries: From Russia With Love (1963), and Dr. No (1962). You can keep up with all the Bondfinger news on Twitter and Facebook.
It’s time to bid a fond farewell to Lis Sladen as Sarah Jane Smith, and what better way to do that than blowing her up, hypnotising her, sticking her in an exploding nuclear reactor and dangling her over the edge of a precipice in The Hand of Fear? Till we meet again, Sarah.
Buy the story!
The Hand of Fear was released on DVD way back in 2006. (Amazon US) (Amazon UK)
Notes and links
Fans of Bob Baker and Dave Martin’s tendency to run out of ideas will enjoy K9 and the Time Trap, one of four K9 adventure books written by Dave Martin and published in 1980.
Florana is the beautiful planet that Pertwee persuaded Sarah to visit on holiday at the end of Invasion of the Dinosaurs.
Outland (2012) is a six-part ABC comedy series written by John Richards and Adam Richard, about a group of gay SF fans, full to the brim of hilarious Doctor Who references. John Richards is also one of the hosts of the Splendid Chaps podcast, which reflected on the history of Doctor Who in the lead-up to the 50th anniversary.
The Flight Through Entirety vanity James Bond project continues with Bondfinger, our commentary podcast on the James Bond films. We have already done two commentaries: From Russia With Love (1963), and Dr. No (1962), with more on the way. You can keep up with all the Bondfinger news — including an upcoming commentary on Goldfinger early next month — on Twitter and Facebook.
Well, Todd’s enthusiastic, Brendan’s cheerful and Nathan just wishes there was a Sontaran involved. We’re off to the Duchy of San Martino in Wales, where clichéd but gorgeously-designed things are afoot in The Masque of Mandragora.
Watch the show
The Masque of Mandragora was released on DVD in 2010. (Amazon US) (Amazon UK)
Notes and links
Famously, the location work for this story was done in Portmeirion in Wales, which is a tourist thing built last century in the style of an Italian village. It’s probably most famous as the location of Patrick McGoohan’s cult classic The Prisoner (1967). Which is really, really worth watching. You can book your stay in one of Portmeirion’s self-catering villas here, but watch out for bouncing weather ballons.
The BBC Television Shakespeare ran from 1978 to 1984 and included adaptations of all of Shakespeare’s plays. Yes, even Pericles, Prince of Tyre. It was almost completely studio-bound, with sets much like those created by Barry Newbery for Masque. The Wikipedia article is exhaustingly detailed.
Quentin Crisp was a famous twentieth-century English homosexualist and author, made famous by (among other things) his portrayal by Doctor Who’s very own John Hurt in The Naked Civil Servant (1975), a TV movie adaptation of his biography, produced by Verity Lambert. Fancy!
If you’re enjoying your flight, why not check out Bondfinger, our commentary podcast on the James Bond films? There are two commentaries so far: From Russia With Love (1963), and Dr. No (1962), with more on the way. You can keep up with all the Bondfinger news on Twitter and Facebook.
