I watched Doctor Who serial 37 - The Tomb Of The Cybermen today. It was a 4 part serial that aired September 2-23 1967. It's the first serial of the 5th season and it's got Patrick Troughton as the 2nd Doctor. Most of his work is gone and this serial was thought missing. It was found in 1992 in Hong Kong. The Tardis drops the Doctor, Jamie (Frazer Hines) and Victoria (Deborah Watling) on the planet Telos where they find a group of archeologists who have just uncovered the tomb of the Cybermen. The Doctor gets the door open. I would think he'd encourage them to keep it shut but I guess that would mean no story. Let's go in. They find a giant control planel and some other rooms. In one of them the Cybermen are stored in a freezer for survival. It's a pretty impressive set. That's it in the picture above. The thing was filmed at Ealing Studios as the normal studio had no room for something that tall. The outdoor stuff was on film too. They took the film and cut it into the taping of the episode. It was all pretty crude in those days. Some of the other DW dvds have featurettes and interviews that explore the technical aspects of the program. I find those rather interesting.
The woman who financed the expedition turns out to be a rotter who, along with her cronies from The Brotherhood of Logicians, is planning to use the Cybermen and their weapons to take control of the Earth. Of course the Cybermen have their own plans and taking orders from humans is pretty far down their To Do List. They don't keep deals either. They're just dicks for the most part. There's plenty of running about as the various groups vie for the top of the food chain. Since it's his show we know the Doctor will come out on top. Some of the dialog and plot elements are not to my liking. Supposedly intelligent people act rashly or touch things that are obviously dangerous. Sometimes the survivors act surprised. It's annoying and it's on a lot of tv shows. Wait until I start complaining about the 3rd season of The Man From UNCLE.
I was annoyed by the uncovering of the tomb during the first scenes of the archeologists on Telos. They blow the mountain side up. The film crew and cast went out to a real gravel quarry and the effects guys did a good sized explosion with smoke and dust etc. It loooked ok. The archeologists come from hiding to see what they've uncovered. That's them in the second picture, looking at where they blew up the hillside. They don't see anything. Disappointed they turn around to leave. They all turn to our right but one guy. He turns to our left. In the third picture you can see he's only turned about 45%. Look, he shouts. They should have noticed that. Were they so dumb they were looking in the wrong place or was it just bad writing? I don't know. I do know it pulls me out of the story. Even the long shot of the hill with the entrance to the tomb looks different from the place where the explosion happened. When they get to the tomb there is no rubble or gravel around. Totally blown clean I guess. I'm probably too critical. Some of the story was ok but I'm still thinking that this could have made a nice hour long episode instead of 4 half hour ones. The acting is about average for that series. The costumes of the Cybermen aren't too bad and a good part of the sets are ok. Production values would improve with time. Hopefully the scripts will too.
There are a couple of commentary tracks over the episodes and a whole second disc of extra featurettes. I listened to the commentaries at double speed. Just to get through them. The cast and crew talk about the making of the series and working at the BBC in the 60's. I find those bits fascinating. There's a nice history of the Cybermen. I think from seeing that I might like some of the color stories better. At least the production values get better. Still the story is important to liking a program. Everyone interviewed seems to like the serial much better than I do. Appearently it's a classic. I don't find it totally awful or anything but I certainly don't think the stories or the characters are as wonderous as they do. The Cybermen are a pretty good villian but from the featurette on their appearances in the series they just don't seem to be that great a villian. They all get a big F for Fail stamped on their heads for everytime the Doctor has come up against them. Might be a good thing, a show with just Cybermen wouldn't really have much plot or dialog.
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