Doctor Who (1 Viewer)

[The Obsolete Man]

Could any fans / experts of Dr. Who let me know what the best package of the entire series is to purchase? I know there is another series (2005?); I'm thinking primarily of researching the 1963-1989 series in the hopes of one day obtaining it. Many thanks in advance.

In addition to Adam's info, you have come into classic Who serial collecting a bit late. Serials are starting to fall out of print and command high dollar prices. The Seventh Doctor's final season, for example (well, the final season of the original run) has been hit pretty hard, with most serials from that year currently going for 50 bucks new on Amazon from a third party seller.

But, that's only if you're looking for region 1 discs. If you're in the UK or can play region 2 discs, you should be fine.

 

[Ockeghem]

Obsolete Man,Thank you as well. I have a multi-regional player, so this is good to know. I appreciate it.

 

[The Obsolete Man]

And one other thing about regional differences...The First Doctor serial "The Chase" has a music edit in the R1 release, where film of The Beatles in Top of the Pops (IIRC) had to be cut because of US Music rights issues. The clip is still present in the R2 release, and the episode is complete.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Speaking of multi-region and all that, I have a question maybe you guys can help with. My girlfriend got me into Doctor Who (the newer series) and I'm rewatching her region 1/US DVDs of some Tennant and they don't look all that good. I figured that's just the end result of watching SD material that was shot in PAL but converted to NTSC and now being watched on a larger screen. It's acceptable but I'm hoping to do better, I'd love to surprise her with better discs. So there are the Blu-rays, but I'm not convinced they'll be much better. It's still SD material just upconverted. Has the frame rate been messed with too? Plus that set is pretty expensive. On the other hand, I have a region free player that can output PAL, and my projector can play PAL native. So I'm thinking the Region 2 DVDs are as close to the source as you can get on these. Anyone got any experience with these?

 

[FoxyMulder]

So there are the Blu-rays, but I'm not convinced they'll be much better. It's still SD material just upconverted. Has the frame rate been messed with too? Plus that set is pretty expensive.

I thought it went HD with Planet of the Dead, any blu ray releases from that one onwards would be proper HD and not upscaled.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

True - forgot to mention, we have the Blu-rays of the Tennant specials and all the Matt Smith shows afterwards. So it's really a matter of upgrading series 1-4 from the US DVDs, if there's something better to be had.

 

[Simon Massey]

The reviews I have read seem to suggest the Series 1-4 US Blurays are the best there is at present. They haven't been released in the UK I don't think either.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

The reviews I have read seem to suggest the Series 1-4 US Blurays are the best there is at present. They haven't been released in the UK I don't think either.

Interesting. I thought I had read some complaints about the US Blu-rays being slightly slowed down (from 25fps to 24fps) and not looking much better than the DVDs. Of course I can't find those reviews from last year when they came out. Just want to send a quick thanks - I appreciate everyone's feedback!

 

[JohnS]

What did you guys think about episode 2 "Into the Dalek"
I'm really liking Peter Capaldi doctor, especially the way he's startignt o play out in this episode.

And we get another person being "transported" to Missy.

 

[Keith Cobby]

I have now caught up on the first two episodes and think that Peter Capaldi will be good as Doctor Who. Not too sure about the story lines. For me it hasn't been as good since Russell T Davies left the show.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Interesting. I thought I had read some complaints about the US Blu-rays being slightly slowed down (from 25fps to 24fps) and not looking much better than the DVDs. Of course I can't find those reviews from last year when they came out.

Yes, the 25fps to 24fps slowdown is why I don't recommend the US Blu-Ray upconverts. For US viewers, the Blu-Rays do offer slightly higher resolution than the DVDs, since they were sourced from the 576 line PAL masters instead of the 480 line NTSC masters.

I have now caught up on the first two episodes and think that Peter Capaldi will be good as Doctor Who. Not too sure about the story lines. For me it hasn't been as good since Russell T Davies left the show.

Series 5 is my favorite run of the entire run, and I thought series 6 had a lot to recommend it. Series 7 is probably the low point of the current run, though.The biggest problem I had with "Into the Dalek" was that it just didn't feel fresh enough for the second episode of a new Doctor. I did like the point of the story though, and the differences between the Doctor and Clara on soldiers.The writing of Danny Pink, the military veteran teacher at the Coal Hill School who Clara fancies, could have been more subtle and understated. That said, I thought Sam Anderson brought a lot to the role, and I liked the return of more grounded scenes to balance out the insanity that is life with the Doctor.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Yes, the 25fps to 24fps slowdown is why I don't recommend the US Blu-Ray upconverts. For US viewers, the Blu-Rays do offer slightly higher resolution than the DVDs, since they were sourced from the 576 line PAL masters instead of the 480 line NTSC masters.

So..being that my DVD player and projector can both do native PAL, do you think the Region 2 DVDs of series 1-4 would be an improvement on the region 1 DVDs we currently have?

 

[David Weicker]

So..being that my DVD player and projector can both do native PAL, do you think the Region 2 DVDs of series 1-4 would be an improvement on the region 1 DVDs we currently have?

That would be a yes and no.Yes, the picture quality should be better 576 vs 480. However, some of the original S1-S4 DVDs in the UK had (IIRC) some audio mastering issues, that were fixed by the time the US versions were done (many of the Classic Who had similar type issues).

As for the 25fps vs 24fps, I haven't noticed an issue with S5-S7. Although S5 (and possibly S6) had mastering issues because they were authored in 1080i, but the flag wasn't set correctly, so some machines didn't automatically recognize this and there were playback issues. This could be rectified by manually setting your output to 1080i.

As for Day Of The Doctor, IMO, both 25fps and 24fps are correct. One matches the broadcast, the other the theatrical.

 

[Bryan Tuck]

As for Day Of The Doctor, IMO, both 25fps and 24fps are correct. One matches the broadcast, the other the theatrical.

I guess that's technically correct, but 24fps still feels wrong to me. And the audio is still somewhat flanged. I don't know if that's an artifact of the pitch correction (it doesn't seem to affect Time of the Doctor), but whatever the reason, there are sections that sound pretty terrible.

 

[Wayne_j]

For those interested in Classic Who, there are a large number of stories on Hulu Plus.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

I guess that's technically correct, but 24fps still feels wrong to me. And the audio is still somewhat flanged. I don't know if that's an artifact of the pitch correction (it doesn't seem to affect Time of the Doctor), but whatever the reason, there are sections that sound pretty terrible.

Bryan, do you have an experience comparing the Region 1 NTSC DVDs of seasons 1-4 compared to the region 2 PAL?

 

[Bryan Tuck]

Bryan, do you have an experience comparing the Region 1 NTSC DVDs of seasons 1-4 compared to the region 2 PAL?

I don't; I've actually only really gotten into Who over the last couple of years, and that's been mostly through online streaming services. I don't own any of Seasons 1-4 (though I do have the Tennant Specials Blu-ray set).

I thought about getting that Complete 1-7 box set, but decided not to when I read that the whole thing had been slowed-down. I wish that didn't bother me so much.

I would imagine that the PAL versions of 1-4 would look better than NTSC, but it probably depends on whether your display can actually show true PAL resolution or just converts it to NTSC.

Sorry I'm not much help.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

I'm in the same boat as you - got everything from the Tennant specials onward on Blu already, plus I'm hesitant to get the episodes with the slowdown. My new projector is supposed to be able to do native PAL resolution and frame rate, and my Oppo is supposed to be able to output in PAL - I should probably grab one of my few PAL DVDs, test that out, and then make a decision. I watched a couple random episodes from series 3-4 over the weekend from the Region 1 DVDs, and I think the thing that was bothering me were PAL to NTSC conversion artifacts. I don't think it was the standard def quality in and of itself. Here's hoping.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

I watched a couple random episodes from series 3-4 over the weekend from the Region 1 DVDs, and I think the thing that was bothering me were PAL to NTSC conversion artifacts. I don't think it was the standard def quality in and of itself. Here's hoping.

There's also the peculiar way that new "Who" was shot prior to "Planet of the Dead". They shot interlaced PAL video, 50 fields a second, and then the BBC "filmised" the episodes into 25p. These were then broadcast at 576i50.

My understanding is that the process involved taking the "A" fields as is, and then used elaborate post-processing to align the "B" fields (which were captured 1/50ths of a second later) with the "A" fields to create a consistent image. There were lighting and camera techniques that went hand in hand with this, and it was on the whole enormously successful at approximating a film look. But the process did introduce the occasional artifacts, which were doubtless only compounded by the PAL to NTSC conversion.One project I would like to see is for the BBC to reconstruct the Eighth Doctor TV movie from the original film elements for Blu-Ray. The TV movie was shot on 35mm at 24 frames per second. Separate NTSC and PAL masters were created for the US and UK broadcasts. For whatever reason, all home video releases have been sourced from the PAL master. The TV movie was sped up from 24fps to 25fps (the reverse of what we're seeing now) for the PAL master, with the attendant impact on the audio pitch. For the Region 1 DVD, this sped up PAL master was then put through the regular PAL to NTSC conversion process, with all of the issues that that brings, while still being slightly sped up. The prospect hangs out there of a truly high definition 24 fps version of the TV movie some day.

 

[Jeffery_H]

The biggest problem I had with "Into the Dalek" was that it just didn't feel fresh enough for the second episode of a new Doctor. I did like the point of the story though, and the differences between the Doctor and Clara on soldiers.The writing of Danny Pink, the military veteran teacher at the Coal Hill School who Clara fancies, could have been more subtle and understated. That said, I thought Sam Anderson brought a lot to the role, and I liked the return of more grounded scenes to balance out the insanity that is life with the Doctor.

I will post more details and my thoughts on the new series later, but for the most part I really like what Capaldi is doing compared with Smith.

However, the writing on the shows, especially Into The Dalek has been pretty poor so far. The Doctor having "problems" or issues with soldiers and such was just dreadful writing no matter how you look at it. First, that's a BIG slap in the face of a blatant political statement that takes the show out of fantasy and into reality. Second, its totally WRONG for the character of The Doctor. He has ALWAYS been accepting of all people, including soldiers. Such as:

1. He worked for UNIT his entire time as the 3rd Doctor.

2. The Brigadier was one of the Doctor's close friends. Also, Sgt. Benson and Capt. Mike Yates.

3. He had a savage warrior/soldier as his companion as the 4th Doctor, Leela, that was very popular.

4. He had a male Scottish warrior as a companion, Jamie, as the 2nd Doctor.

The list goes on and on, so I will stop there. Simply put, it was sloppy writing and not at all part of who the Doctor is for his whole life.