Doctor Who Lost in the Dark Dimension THE MOVIE
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Well, I have finally laid a 26 year old ghost to rest by just watching this animated omnibus version of LOST IN THE DARK DIMENSION. It is done well enough to give you a really good sense of how it would have been on screen back in 1993.
Verdict.
Average. Painfully average. In the same way that a lot of those BBV type dramas like SHAKEDOWN and DOWNTIME are now when I look back at those.
Doubtless, if it had been made, it would have been lapped up like manna from Heaven by starving fans at the time. DOCTOR WHO MAGAZINE would have largely raved over it and done endless articles and interviews, before disillusionment set in and a backlash began.
The script says more about the author as a fan than it does about a thirty year old series.
Two echoes of the show in this story that I noticed.....
- Main villain has been scattered throughout time in different forms and is engineering the end of humanity. (Author has seen and liked CITY OF DEATH)
- Fourth Doctor has a swordfight with the main villain. (Author has seen and liked THE ANDROIDS OF TARA)
- A group of mercenaries have travelled back in time to kill a politician. (Author has seen and liked THE DAY OF THE DALEKS)
Ah yes, the Fourth Doctor.
The main heroes of this drama are The Fourth Doctor and his companion Ace, along with The Brigadier and Summerfield, one of the aforementioned adversaries. (Ace is going out with the Brig's son, Alex by the way.)
The other actors to have played the Doctor are - apart from tacked on appearances - genuinely irrelevant to the plot, save for token appearances, which the stroke of a writer's pen could have chopped out of the story at anytime.
So you don't have to sit through this 1 hour and 50 minute "epic" (surely the broadcast version would have been a more tightly compressed 90 mins?) I will give you the time codes for where other Doctor's appear and their entire contributions to this story celebrating 30 years.....:
PERTWEE: 56:40..... Appears as a ghostly figure in the "limbo" of the "vortex" and starts chatting to the start of the show, Tom, for a few moments.
1:00:15.... Chats some more to Tom, offering him a morale boosting pep-talk to aid Teeth and Curls on his continuing mission. Then fades and vanishes.
Errm.... That's it.....
DAVISON: 49:25.... Our heroes, Ace and the Brig are being chased by Cybermen, when Doctor 5 suddenly appears and stuns the silver fools with a large gun.
53:15..... Has a completely irrelevant (to the plot) argument with an imprisoned Cyberman about why the Cyber-race will logically destroy itself one day after they have conquered the universe.
57:00..... Talks about entropy, timelines and alternative realities to The Brig and Ace for only a few sentences, before more Cybermen arrive, followed by Daleks. The Daleks have a momentary dust up with the Cybers, then the Daleks "intercept the Doctor" and vanish into thin air with old Fivey.
1:03:30..... In background of scene in cryotube, alongside Colin. Unconscious while Tom plays out huge showdown with main villain in same room. Never wakes and fades away eventually, when timeline is restored, thanks to Tom.
COLIN: 1:02:25.... Colin is the defence judge in a trial (yawn!), defending the Ice Warriors from being framed for something. Said trial is completely irrelevant to the plot. The Brig walks in, just as the Doc is building up to his main point.
1:09:50.... Sixey has a chat with the Brig in the corridor outside about the need for Tom to locate the missing Tardis, then the Daleks turn up and fade away with him as they did Davison. Brig has leapt back into the vortex by this point.
1:03:30..... In background of scene in cryotube, alongside Davison. Unconscious while Tom plays out huge showdown with main villain in same room. Never wakes and fades away eventually, when timeline is restored, thanks to Tom.
MCCOY: 1:10.....Dead at start.... and given a Viking burial after credits.
1:05:50.... Ace meets him in the vortex/limbo.... He chats to her around a campfire for a few broken up moments.....during which he info. dumps all the explanations for the mysteries of what has been happening to Ace so far.
1:16:05..... Tom turns up to collect his companion, Ace, and the Mcoy Doctor promptly collapses, dies again, and fades away at their feet.
1:44:45..... Back from dead after Tom has finished his full-blown action/adventure.... .... then gets - admittedly - the closing scenes with Ace and final Tardis fade away.
I have little doubt that the script sent to the Pertwee home ended up nailed to the loo wall.I can't believe the Adrian Rigglesford was so dumb that he thought the other actors would be fine with Tom getting, not only the lion's share of the action as the blatant main star of the show, but a full on sword-fight at the end (while Colin and Peter look on, unconscious in cryotubes) while adopting Ace as his companion.
No other companions make an appearance.
So no, I don't think we were robbed. And I don't think this is a very good drama in it's own right. It reminds me of that AIRZONE SOLUTION in being kinda lame and indebted to past stories, just as AIRZONE was clearly riffing on EDGE OF DARKNESS. In fact, this throws in a heavy-handed subtext about the damaging of the environment.
DIMENSIONS IN TIME, for all it's faults, was at least made with an undercurrent of love for the entire past of the show itself and did not favour one contributor over any others.
Not a lost classic.