4K Ultra-HD & Blu-ray Review | Game of Thrones: The Complete Eighth Season

Game of Thrones’ final season was never going to please everyone – in large part because nobody really wanted to see it end. Despite the coming of efficiency and three seasons’ worth of intense narrative attrition, the show inspired by George R R Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire could have quite easily filled another season or two. Indeed, had it run to a hundred episodes or so instead of just seventy-three, it could have avoided much of the passionate criticism levelled at its long-awaited final run. Whether you’re outraged by a character’s “turn” or left incredulous about the identity of the winner of the eponymous game, the vast majority of the show’s problems seem to stem from a lack of connective tissue. 

Nobody seems to know exactly why the showrunners elected to complete Martin’s epic tale in such summary fashion. Whether it was the prospect of helming a new Star Wars saga, contractual issues with the show’s stars, or even the absence of any source material to help steer them, Season 8 saw David Benioff and D B Weiss compress several seasons’ worth of plot and character development into just six episodes. If Martin ever finishes his sprawling saga, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if we find that the events of his final book, A Dream of Spring, had been squeezed into the series’ final three (admittedly near-feature-length) episodes. 

The general reaction to the season, coupled with this set’s hefty £61.27 RRP, might explain why this 4K Ultra-HD and Blu-ray steelbook didn’t sell out long before its release date came around – something quite shocking, really, given the series’ prior popularity. Yet beyond an inexcusable muddling of bastard surnames (it’s Waters, not Rivers!) and a distinct, though at least mirthfully acknowledged, dearth of elephants, there is very little wrong with what we see on screen in Season 8. Seasoned performers deliver career-defining performances in episodes as claustrophobic and character-driven as “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms” - a clear contender for latter-day Thrones’ best episode – while acclaimed action director Miguel Sapochnik delivers not one but two all-out battles that would shame most blockbusters, and could not be more different from one another – quite literally night and day. Better still, these spectacular set pieces serve the characters’ arcs beautifully, guiding the series towards its promised “bittersweet” conclusion that’s as much a meditation on power and consequence as it is a satisfying epilogue to a story almost a decade in the telling. 

 

Yet the season left many vocal viewers bitterly disappointed, with most citing a lack of character development as their primary gripe. I don’t think that the real issue is a lack of character development, though – it’s more a lack of viewer insight into it. Much is made of the finale’s time-jump, but this is only the last of many such jumps spread throughout the season – it’s just that the others were not so obvious. Take the much-maligned fourth episode of the season, “The Last of the Starks”, for instance, which featured several. Few episodes have ever started as well as this one does, and in it the writers do an exceptional job of progressing the Jaime / Brienne relationship to its obvious conclusion – they even manage to appease Tormund / Brienne ’shippers into the bargain with some of the series’ funniest-ever scenes. Yet, by the end of this episode, Jaime and Brienne have moved from consummating their relationship, through innumerable weeks of co-habiting, all the way to Jaime leaving her to return to Cersei. Had this storyline been played out in the fourth season or earlier, they would have got together in episode two or three and not separated until the season finale. Here, though, we miss everything but the bookends. If Martin ever publishes A Dream of Spring, no doubt he’ll treat us to many immersive Jaime and Brienne chapters focusing on the minutiae of their life together in Winterfell and, in Jaime’s case, the constant pull of Cersei - a pull made irresistible once he learns of Dany’s impending attack on King’s Landing. The story is perfect, and the execution is sublime - but all the show offers us are snapshots of it. Consequently, Jaime’s departure at the end of the episode feels abrupt, perhaps even against the grain, when really it’s anything but if you take a larger view. 

Jaime and Brienne’s relationship is perhaps the most extreme instance of the season’s narrative density, but it is by no means the most keenly felt. Even the central story of Dany’s increasingly tyrannical behaviour the closer she gets to the corrupting influence of the Iron Throne is addressed only in disjointed fragments, placing the onus on the viewer to join the dots in much the same way that Emilia Clarke reportedly had to keep a Daenerys diary to be able to understand the character’s trajectory so that she might portray it as astoundingly as she does. Even in the explainer culture of 2019, this is asking a lot of an audience, particularly when many watching don’t want to make sense of “The Bells” because they are so opposed to their beloved Khaleesi’s actions. Had Game of Thrones done what I hope A Dream of Spring will, and allowed us intimate insight into Dany’s thoughts and feelings as she felt the pull of the throne with her friends and dragons’ bodies mounting around her, I think that their reaction would have been very different indeed. 

I do have some of my own issues with season, though these are relatively minor in comparison to those generally seized upon. Most of these were things that I thought ought to have played a part in the endgame; things that I can’t conceive Martin intends to leave out of his books. Arya doesn’t wear a single face all season, for instance, meaning that the only payoff for her becoming a fully-fledged Faceless Man was her murder of the Freys at the start of last season – something that will surely fall to Lady Stoneheart in print. Worse, the direwolves, introduced in the series’ first episode and clearly set up to play a major part in the resolution of the series, are represented only by Ghost who ultimately contributes nothing more than an ear to the defence of the realm. My biggest gripe, though, has to be with Bronn and that damned crossbow. You don’t give a mercenary a weapon like that at the start of the season and not have him fire it by the season’s end. Don’t get me wrong, I would have hated it had he actually killed one of the Lannisters – even Cersei – which only goes to show how ill-conceived the whole angle was. It was clearly crowbarred in simply to give a popular character something to do ahead of his appointment as master of coin and lord of High Garden - two unlikely things that I want to hate, logically, but love all the same. Damn you, Jerome Flynn. 

Other instinctive gripes I’ve worked through. I was equally thrilled and vindicated when Arya slew the Night King as Ramijn Djawadi’s score reached its eight-season zenith, but part of me still wanted some context to the war that we’d just witnessed; an explanation for the return of the dead and the coming of winter. I wanted to know more about the apparently victorious R’hllor, the Lord of Light; I wanted a window into the magic of Westeros, a demystification of the lore. But then a single word popped into my head, and my grievance promptly evaporated: midichlorians. 

My main complaint with “The Iron Throne”, the series finale, is with its prosaic title. Martin’s own “A Dream of Spring”, or, better still, his abandoned original title, “A Time for Wolves”, would have been infinitely preferable. “The Iron Throne” is, at least, an accurate billing though as the tale boils right down to the pointy chair at centre of the saga and the damage wrought by its corrupting power. Jon and Dany’s final scene together couldn’t be more perfect. The falling ash might be a retcon of the snow Dany saw fall in her second-season foreshadowing of this very moment, but it doesn’t matter – you can still feel the circle closing like a noose around her tragic neck. Kit Harington and Emilia Clarke almost have me in tears with their performances every time I watch this; Drogon actually does as he nuzzles the dead body of his mother. Almost as moving is his surprisingly discriminate torching of the throne room and melting of the Iron Throne itself. It’s a thing of physical and literal beauty which proves beyond doubt that dragons really are as intelligent as men.

The latter half of the finale had the more challenging job of putting the “sweet” into “bittersweet” while also resolving every lingering plot thread – which is to say, most of them. Unfortunately the scene in the Dragon Pit stands up to no scrutiny whatsoever – whilst I have no doubt Martin has always planned to give Bran the crown (go back and rewatch “Winter is Coming” – Game of Thrones begins and ends with him), and for much the same reasons as those posited by Tyrion, I can’t believe that he’d end up with it as the result of a prisoner’s suggestion. On TV, Bran’s ascension also grates as it’s ostensibly because he has “the best story”, when in fact his story has been so relentlessly dull throughout the entire show that his character was even written out for an entire season when the writers ran into a brick wall with him. This isn’t a fault of the character, or even actor Isaac Hempstead-Wright, who truly comes into his own in these last six episodes, but rather a lacklustre attempt to render a character whose real domain is not the world of men but an ethereal world of visions and omens. 

“I thought I was wise, but I wasn’t.”

 

Similarly, the succession of the North under Queen Sansa is a fitting end to both her personal story and that of the larger kingdom, but it’s dealt with as an afterthought and met with no resistance from anyone. None. Surely the new prince of Dorne would request the same liberty for his own kingdom? Or the fiercely independent Iron Islanders? And what about Northern remainers? Are we expected to believe that the Northerners are like those of us in Britain where “every man, woman and child voted to leave” (check with Little Brexit if you don’t believe me). If it wasn’t for the comic relief of Edmure’s pomposity and Sam’s naivety (his nervous proposal to have a people’s vote is the scene’s highlight), not to mention Peter Dinklage making a rousing speech in the most improbable of situations, the scene might not have worked at all. As it is, though, it gets the job done quickly and efficiently – sentiments that apply to well over half the season. 

The concluding scene in the council chamber is fun, whilst still managing to convey Martin’s obsession with the practicalities of ruling. This is the guy who read The Lord of the Rings and loved it, but then found himself questioning Aragorn’s post-war plans for taxation and his policy towards the surviving orcs. “The Iron Throne” might not delve heavily into the minutiae of public office, but it does at least hint at the municipal challenges awaiting our council of fan favourites and their good king, and does so with its tongue heavily planted it its cheek. Closing the last discussion in the series with an argument over public spending – and an anecdote about a goat in a brothel – is something that Martin will have to work hard to top. 

The inevitable montage that closes the show is rousing, beautiful and serves our surviving wolves well. Jon had to go into the North, just as Sansa had to become a queen – their stories couldn’t really have ended any other way. A nice and unexpected touch with Jon’s farewell, though, is its open-endedness – will he take the black again, or does he plan to just head North with the Free Folk? Or can he reconcile the two? Either way, it feels right. Arya’s triumphant departure is probably more satisfying still as she sails boldly west of Westeros, for the first time in a long time her eyes full of adventure instead of vengeance. My favourite moment, though, is Brienne quietly sitting down to write up the exploits of Jaime Lannister in the White Book – it’s the most moving end to an arc in the whole damned show. 

Click image to enlarge

The steelbook itself is presented in a style largely in keeping with its seven predecessors’, despite the addition of the three 4K UHD discs here on top of the three Blu-rays. Its artwork is gorgeous, evoking the iconic map traversed by the series’ much celebrated title sequence, only rendered in a neutered near-monochrome palette that’s tastefully accented with browns and golds. The set even includes a magnetic sigil that nestles perfectly over its corresponding image on the front, which will no doubt please those who’ve collected all eight across the series. Once my steelbook has been shelved, though, my magnet will probably end up on the fridge alongside Heisenberg and the other “collectable” Blu-ray magnets that I’ve accumulated over the years. 

Click image to enlarge

 

The steelbook’s outer packaging is surprisingly well-built, vac-formed from plastic rather than printed on cheap card, and thus offering both the steelbook and its (as packaged, separated) sigil adequate protection in transit while also making mint-condition resale simple for the more mercenary of purchasers. The steelbook’s interior is somewhat less inspiring, as the welcome choice to retain the standard Blu-ray-steelbook dimensions has resulted in a layout in which we have two spindles to stack six discs. It’s the least worst option, admittedly, given that the alternatives would involve either enlarging the steelbook or, worse, inserting a couple of fragile Amaray trays, but it’s still almost certain to attract a flood of complaints. However, as packaged the three Blu-rays fill up one spindle and the three 4K UHD discs the other; it’s worth considering that it makes managing the discs much easier if you put discs one and two of your preferred format (which together house five of the season’s six episodes) on top of each spindle, with the corresponding disc three underneath one of them. 

“Get a better TV.”

- Miguel Sapochnik, “The Long Night” commentary

Of course, stunningly presented as it is, the main reason that I was looking forward to this release wasn’t for its packaging. I’ve been desperate to revisit “The Long Night”, an episode slammed by many for its cinematography, only this time with the benefit of Dolby Vision HDR. In the culmination of the series’ war against the dead, Sapochnik tries to take realism to the nth degree; certain scenes appear to only be lit by their natural elements, typically fire. This was not conveyed well by streaming services, to say the least – on Apple TV’s NOW TV app in the UK, it was incredibly difficult to see what was going on. Even accounting for the occasional drop in image quality when my Internet connection waned (something that, interestingly, never seems to happen with the Netflix or BBC iPlayer apps on the same device), the image was either too dark to make sense of, or, if I turned up my TV’s backlight to full, washed out and grey. Fortunately, this UHD disc conveys something much closer to what I imagine Sapochnik intended. Whilst the upscaled image on the 4K UHD disc does appear sharper than on its Blu-ray counterpart (which I have used for the 1080p screengrabs featured in this review), probably more attributable to its higher bit rate than its artificially greater resolution, what leaps out about the presentation is its dynamic colour range. Now, fire burns bright. Black is much closer to black. The director’s bold artistic choice is finally done justice, and whilst “The Long Night” is still abounding with the show-typical mêlée madness that made even broad-daylight battles like “The Battle of the Bastards” hard to follow, the technical quality is on a par with other darkly graded 4K UHD releases such as Solo: A Star Wars Story and Watchmen. At last, “The Long Night” is truly the thrilling, nail-biting triumph that it was always intended to be - its darkness speaks to its tone, and its writing and direction are clever enough to create a battle-authentic sense of mayhem while still making sure than any moments that matter are clearly telegraphed. 

 

However, though it enhances enjoyment of 95% of the season’s sound and visuals, the 4K UHD presentation also shines a light on the season’s shortcomings – most notably its overuse of green screen. It’s infuriating to have such a jaw-dropping finish marred by cost-cutting, spoiler-protecting nonsense like using CSO to show Pilou Asbæk on the deck of the Silence. Season 8 contains some of the most beautiful effects shot that I’ve ever seen – Drogon and Rhaegal hovering above the clouds in winter moonlight, for instance – and to see these juxtaposed with shots barely worthy of 1970s Doctor Who is a crime. Fortunately the same cannot be said of the immersive 7.1 Dolby Atmos soundtrack, which seems to have been precision engineered to get as much out of the format as is possible on a TV budget. “The Long Night” and “The Bells” are as immersive as any action movie that you’d hear at the cinema, and though the season’s quieter episodes don’t often make use of the additional Atmos channels, they still deliver a vast and vibrant soundscape. Better still, audiophiles yet to make the leap to 4K needn’t miss out on the aural excellence as the Blu-ray discs also contain the Atmos soundtracks (though, as on the 4K UHD discs, they aren’t the default audio track). 

The exclusive bonus material on offer is expectedly disappointing, offering only narrow insight into two key episodes. There is no series (or even season) retrospective, precious little is said about how much future book knowledge the showrunners had been privy to when they penned this final season (surely it can’t have been limited to just Bran’s fate...?), and none of the questions raised in this review (such as why the showrunners were in such a hurry to finish the show) are even broached. Instead, we are offered just two half-hour features that add little to the conversation. First up is When Winter Falls - an unabashed puff piece, albeit a well-deserved one, that celebrates the incredible work that went into filming the Battle of Winterfell depicted in “The Long Night” over fifty-five freezing Northern Irish nights.

Despite being similarly restricted in its scope, “Duty is the Death of Love” is slightly more enjoyable. Benefitting from its treading of new ground (for some reason, “The Iron Throne” was not given the same Inside the Episode and Game Revealed treatment as the rest of the season’s episodes), the cast and showrunners finally lift the veil of the making of the series’ long-awaited and insanely divisive finale. The cast discuss the culmination of their characters’ respective arcs while the production team share the secrets behind such matters as the melting of the throne, or the groundbreaking use of virtual reality to aid practical set design. The commentaries on offer are more of a mixed bag, ranging from the raw and raucous (musings on marsupials and their sexual health, complaints from the director of “The Long Night” about the picture being too dark and not being able to see who’s just died, Pilou Asbæk confessing to not reading scripts and not paying attention to other actors’ lines, Fabian Wagner asking his co-commentators if they’ve signed the petition to have the season remade yet...) clean and clinical, but overall they offer a more rounded, less sanitised look at the making of the final run. 

“A palace without people is a tomb. A realm without people is scenery.”

 

The set also includes five deleted scenes, the longest of which barely clocks in at two minutes (including the lengthy, contextual padding to either side), and none of which would have made much of a difference to anybody had they made the air. Even Grey Worm’s exit and Missandei’s subsequent “headache” at the feast would have added precious little to their coming tragedy given the attention already afforded to their characters. The six Histories & Lore segments are much more welcome, though. Whilst they revisit certain topics broached in earlier seasons’ editions, it’s from very different vantage points this time around, and with a level of vivid colour that sets them apart from most previous entries in the series - the deep purples and turquoises of the Greyjoy Rebellion are particularly striking. Having thoroughly enjoyed Fire & Blood earlier this year, I particularly relished the five-minute instalment on Maegor the Cruel, but “The Defiance of Duskendale” is more interesting still as it concerns a period much closer to the start of the series that Martin’s epic Targaryen history has yet to reach - one that draws a fascinating parallel between the “mad” Aerys II and his daughter.

The set’s flagship bonus feature is not exclusive to it – I watched it on NOW TV back in late May - but it’s no less valuable as result. Directed by Jeanie Finlay, the 113-minute Last Watch is really a film in its own right. Unlike many documentaries of the same type, it takes a fascinating look at production from the ground up – the showrunners are dim and distant figures here; the stars of this one are the people on the ground. Production managers. Extras. Security guards. I’d challenge anyone to watch this and then in good conscience lobby for a Season 8 remake. These exceptional people practically killed themselves to make this phenomenal show. 

Game of Thrones has always been a series that requires its viewers to do more than just watch, and this is never more true than in its final six episodes. It makes you do your homework. You have to be prepared to join the dots. If you do, though, the rewards are immense. As I thoroughly enjoyed it each week on NOW TV, I felt the same rage burn that I did when Star Wars fans relentlessly trolled Rian Johnson following the release of Star Wars: The Last Jedi. There we were, being gifted with this enchanting and spectacular thing, and all people wanted to do was take to the Internet to spew their bile all over it. Forty-odd quid might seem a lot to pay for lone season of a TV series, but when you consider than you’re getting six movies – seven, if you count The Last Watch – in a level of quality that most consumers couldn’t have even conceived of a decade ago, it starts to look at lot like a bargain. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Game of Thrones: The Complete Eighth Season 4K Ultra-HD / Blu-ray steelbook is available now, with today’s cheapest retailer being Zavvi, who have it listed for £40.49 plus £1.99 delivery when using the discount code STEELBOOK.

TV Review | The Orville created by Seth MacFarlane

Star Trek’s all-conquering return to television all but quashed any interest that I might have once had in watching Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane’s unexpected foray into the genre. Seemingly destined to be either a brazenly derivative substitute or a weightless pastiche, I really didn’t think that The Orville would be able to win me over. A short-lived £4.99 price tag on its first season compelled me to at least give it a chance.

With Jon Favreau (Iron Man, The Lion King, The Mandalorian) at the helm of the series’ pilot, The Orville’s first surprise is its cinematic sheen. The ship itself is slick and intricately detailed, and whilst instantly evoking the sense of a Federation starship (Voyager in particular), it manages to distinguish itself through an imaginative rear end - its innovative nacelle arrangement makes it look like the product of a union between spaceship and squid. Exuding the same sense of expense while eschewing any modern sense of style, the whole show proves to be a dazzling and colourful feast for the eyes; an apparently conscious melding of Star Trek and Star Trek: The Next Generation that at times feels like a flip of the bird to the ubiquitously dark Star Trek: Discovery and its imminent sister series.

More astonishing still is the show’s substance. Growing organically out of its comedy is an oxymoronic, down-to-Earth ambience that, due in part to basic decency, its genre rivals just can’t match. There’s not a fanciful matter transporter in sight, yet the series leaves viewers with no question marks whatsoever over the ship’s plumbing. The Orville has toilets, as we establish very early on when Gordon does his best to hold in a piss while accosted by Kelly, the new first officer (and the captain’s ex-wife), just outside the bogs. Such awkward mundanities conjure a very real sense of the ship being an authentic workplace, rather than a container for all of humanity’s distilled aspirations and virtues. 

From top to bottom, the Orville’s crew are a study in plausible imperfection. Captain Mercer and Kelly are divorced, and it’s awkward. The helmsmen are pissheads, and don’t seem to really give a shit about anything. The security chief has the strength of ten men, which just about everyone that she dates seems to feel threatened by, much to her frustration. Even the ship’s resident android (brilliantly underplayed by newcomer Mark Jackson), a student of humanity in the mould of his Star Trek antecedent, has a convincingly disturbing edge to him - in one especially memorable episode he amputates a colleague’s leg - and then hides it! - in an attempt to master practical joking, such is his ignorance of that imperceptible line between an artful jape and grievous bodily harm which most humans have mastered by toddlerhood.

Yet The Orville’s humour belies a level of narrative sophistication which sometimes eclipses the franchise that it so overtly seeks to emulate. “About a Girl” is built on the hysterical incongruity that Bortus, the ship’s Worf, comes from an almost exclusively male, egg-laying species. Imagine Worf sat naked in his quarters atop a seat-sized egg, griping about his husband’s low mood and disinterest in sex, and you’ll get a sense of the flavour. Behind such knee-jerk laughter, though, is a challenging and contemporary ethical tale as ambitious as any ever broached in Star Trek. If it’s morally acceptable for a human parent to circumcise a child, then why can’t a Moclan “correct” his child’s gender if she hatches female? It’s a Roddenberry-esque ethical quandary, and one that’s bang on the zeitgeist to boot, yet it never really feels like it as it’s couched in exquisite eggshell comedy. Only afterwards do you realise that MacFarlane has snuck in and Trekked you.

Just as provocative is first-season highlight “Majority Rule”, in which the Orville visits a world subject to “total democracy”. There is no legal system, no constitution, no rights to speak of – it’s a populist nightmare governed entirely by its citizens’ aggregated like and dislike votes. With its apology tours and downvote discrimination, MacFarlane’s script extrudes an entire culture from the very worst aspects of our social media, offering us a sobering look at our potential near future while laughing our heads off at Lieutenant LaMarr dry humping a statue.

As with any ensemble piece, The Orville is only as good as its regular cast – which is fortunate, as MacFarlane’s bridge crew each deliver one polished performance after another. This is especially noteworthy as a typical Orville script requires not only great comic timing, but often emotionally challenging character moments and high-stakes drama too. MacFarlane himself is marvellous as Ed Mercer, the antithesis of almost every Starfleet captain ever seen on screen. He’s likeable, competent, and yet beautifully damaged – more the Miles O’Brien everyman than a Jean-Luc Picard or Jim Kirk history-maker. His (somehow likeable) cheating ex-wife Kelly, dexterously played by Adrianne Palicki (Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD), is altogether stronger, but finds herself in the uncomfortable position of serving a captain that she’s screwed over – and on a ship crewed by many of his best mates, such as Scott Grimes’ series-stealing Lieutenant Gordon Malloy. And despite all external appearances and initial impressions, Peter Macon’s Bortus proves to be one of the show’s most rounded and complex characters. The Orville’s second officer may be a great hulking bruiser of an alien who makes Worf seem garrulous, but he’s also a knackered parent and sex-starved husband who’s trying to juggle a demanding job and busy private life.

Just as captivating is Halston Sage’s super-powered security chief, Lieutenant Alara Kitan, whose remarkable strength is dwarfed only by her rampant insecurities. Even John LaMarr (J Lee), whose initial role seems to be limited to giving Gordon a Bro to hang out with, develops into one of the show’s more intriguing and entertaining individuals as we discover that he’s been downplaying his vast intellect because he’s intelligent enough to realise that, more so than ever in a post-currency culture, only fools and horses work. He’s more into boobs and beer than respect and responsibility.

If you need further evidence of the show’s credentials, then just take a look at its first-season’s supporting stars and production team. There’s a Trek family feel with the likes of Penny Johnson Jerald (Deep Space Nine’s Kassidy Yates-Sisko) and Robert Picardo (Voyager’s EMH) frequently popping up on screen, The Next Generation’s Jonathan Frakes and Voyager’s Robert Duncan McNeill behind the camera calling the shots, and even First Contact co-writer and Enterprise co-creator Brannon Braga contributing scripts and direction. There are some mainstream superstars too: Rob Lowe’s (Wayne’s World) loveable yet marriage-wrecking Darulio makes “Cupid’s Dagger” a comic highlight of the season, while Victor Garber (DC’s Legends of Tomorrow) gives the Union’s top brass some wonderfully lifelike cuts and dents, and Charlize Theron’s apparently marooned miner lends the time-travelling shenanigans of “Pria” a deliciously seductive quality. Even Liam Neeson (Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace) has a walk on.

Far from being what I had expected, The Orville shows realistic characters dealing with real issues with real heart and real humour. They aren’t holier-than-thou moral crusaders with an idealistic calling to explore all of known space, they’re just your mates from work or down the pub. It is without a doubt the most grounded space opera that I’ve ever watched, but it can still claim to be one of the wackiest too. A far cry from the high-concept, low-brow humour of Red Dwarf or the barbed philosophical elegance of The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to Galaxy, The Orville is proudly its own thing – a future that we can all believe, if not believe in. 

The Orville’s first season is available to download from iTunes in 1080p HD for £14.99 (sorry, the £4.99 deal ended on 29th January!) Season 2, which is next on my hit list, is the same price, and there is also a two-season box set for £24.99. There is no Blu-ray release in the UK.

#HatTip | Warren Carratt on X-Men #1

Here’s a potentially alluring catch by my buddy Warren Carratt, whose careful reading of the new X-Men #1 has given CBR.com something to run with:

 

 

Only Warren could have spotted a love triangle returning “in a new shape”.

Brilliant.

X-Men #1 is available now. The X-Men find themselves in a whole new world of possibility and things have never been better! Jonathan Hickman and superstar artist Leinil Yu  reveal the saga of Cyclops and his hand-picked squad of mutant powerhouses!  

Blu-ray Review | Doctor Who: The Collection – Season 23

Above: The Blu-ray booklet’s dramatic artwork

As its DVD range was so exhaustive, making Doctor Who probably the best-documented series in the history of television, opportunities for the new Blu-ray collections to expound upon the existing bonus material seemed to be limited. However, whilst BBC Studios have seized the opportunity to plug the occasional gap with new and dynamic ‘making of’ features for serials like Castrovalva and Black Orchid (though not Meglos, obviously – nobody wants to watch Meglos, let alone The Making of Meglos), the preponderance of the new material has been reality-based, reflecting the cultural change in general viewing habits since the DVD range was launched twenty years ago next month. Even if you can’t stand most reality TV, rest assured that the Doctor Who spin on it is instantly loveable as its innocent charm supplants the cynical greed often engendered by the genre. These new features don’t focus on shallow, wannabe superstars but rather people who, after hundreds of hours’ worth of featurettes and commentaries, feel like old friends. 

 

Season 23 is the most entertaining release yet on this front, topping even the incredibly immersive Season 19. Not only are we treated to four hefty editions of Behind the Sofa and further instalments in The Writers’ Room and In Conversation series, but we are also served up a couple of unique offerings: The Doctor’s Table and The Doctor Who Cookbook Revisited. The former is a highlight of the set as Colin Baker (the Doctor), Nicola Bryant (Peri), Bonnie Langford (Mel) and Michael Jayston (the Valeyard) share a meal and their memories of working together on The Trial of a Time Lord.

Above: Two of the guests at The Doctor’s Table



I’ve seen this sort of setup before in other franchises, but rarely does it work as well as it does here. Rather than present the highlights of the diners’ free-flowing conversation, a structure of sorts is imposed as each participant is armed with a set of purposely preposterous questions loosely based on one of the season’s sub-stories which they have to put to their companions. These range from the likes of, “Have you ever been in trouble with the law?” to a cripplingly embarrassing version of Snog Marry Avoid? with a Whoniverse twist. Watching Michael Jayston squirm as he contemplates marriage to the Master or a moment of passion with Mr Popplewick is almost as hilarious as the delirious look on Colin Baker’s face when his pudding arrives.

 

Above: Toby Hadoke challenges Sarah Sutton to prepare her creator’s signature Kipper of Traken



Inspired by an apparently off-the-cuff idea in the Season 18 set’s A Weekend with Waterhouse, The Doctor Who Cookbook Revisited sees range veteran Toby Hadoke visit a number of the series’ former stars whom he tasks with recreating their respective recipes from Gary Downie’s infamous 1985 cookbook. Presented in the style of shows like Come Dine with Me and The Great British Bake Off, the piece could easily pass for one of them were it not for its firm grounding in irreverent fun. In an especially lovely touch, erstwhile eighth Doctor companion and incumbent voice of Masterchef India Fisher lends her honeyed tones to the programme for its obligatory voiceover segments. However, even Fisher has trouble making Johnny Byrne’s “Kipper of Traken” sound appetising, which may be why it finds itself relegated to the status of “bonus recipe” alongside Patrick Troughton’s “Vegetable Soup with Dalek Krotons” and Sarah Sutton’s less imaginative (but altogether more sumptuous-looking) lasagne.

“As we know from future stuff on Big Finish, it’s a load of baloney anyway.” – Colin Baker

The format of Behind the Sofa took me a while to warm to, as I had preconceptions about it just being an inverted in-picture commentary of the type popular for all of ten minutes back in the mid to late noughties. Behind the Sofa is much more engaging, though, in two key respects: first and foremost, it’s been edited, which is of particular importance when the story being commented on is a fourteen-part behemoth like The Trial of a Time Lord. Only moments that are insightful or amusing are preserved; all those languorous lulls in between are cut. Further pace is injected by the programme’s incisive cutting between two different sets of viewers – in this case the season’s serving TARDIS crew and a crew of an altogether motlier sort comprised of Frazer Hines (Jamie), Matthew Waterhouse (Adric) and Mark Strickston (Turlough). In contrast to the playful bonhomie between Colin Baker and his two trusty companions, the dynamic between the three blokes is very different as Strickson sets himself up as a moderator of sorts, forcing the gushing Waterhouse and generally quite diplomatic Hines to discuss what he sees as some of the serial’s glaring faults. This enlivens this season’s editions quite considerably, taking what on previous releases has been a pleasant wallow in nostalgia and balancing it with some focused discussion.

 

L-R: Christopher H Bidmead, Philip Martin, Eric Saward, Wally K Daly (with his tail at the back)

This season’s edition of The Writers’ Room is every bit as analytical as the Strickson-steered Behind the Sofa, though strictly speaking it isn’t really this season’s edition at all. Rather than discuss The Trial of a Time Lord in any great depth, many of the writers involved with its aborted forebearer gather in a London pub to discuss – and often brutally dissect – one another’s abandoned scripts. Whilst this inevitably covers much of the same ground that The Lost Season featurette did on the DVD, it does so in a much more informal and challenging way as each writer has to defend his work from his peers. Better still, it does so with the benefit of the hindsight offered by Big Finish’s marvellous audio adaptations, allowing audio clips to be presented against colourful CG artwork and simple animation, much of which is photo-real.

 

Above: Still lost in time - Robert Holmes’ Yellow Fever and How to Cure It



The half-hour instalment isn’t without merriment, though. Former script editor Christopher H Bidmead’s accusatory greeting to his successor, Eric Saward, really made me chuckle, while the admission from Wally K Daly that he’s never even watched Doctor Who goes a long way towards explaining The Ultimate Evil. For his part, Philip Martin, the only writer amongst the quartet to receive a writing credit on The Trial of a Time Lord, could not be with his peers in person but FaceTimes it in regardless, his remoteness perhaps allowing him a greater degree of harshness when damning Bidmead’s Hollows of Time with the faintest praise ever heard in a special feature.

Above: An example of Rob Hammond’s fine artwork for The Lost Season featurette (2008)

Completists will be pleased to hear that The Lost Season is carried over from the DVD release, doubling down this set’s exploration of that now well-traversed lost year. The Writers’ Room roundtable may now have surpassed this eleven-year-old piece, but it still remains of interest thanks to Colin Baker’s narration and some stunning artwork from graphic designer Rob Hammond.



Above: Bonnie Langford In Conversation with Matthew Sweet



Indeed, with almost all of the DVD’s bonus material included on this Blu-ray set’s six discs (the only omissions so far as I can tell are a Season 22-themed Lenny Henry sketch; the “Doctor in Distress” music video; and a couple of media clips concerning the series’ hiatus, all of which will probably sit better on the eventual Season 22 release), the only thing that this collection is really wanting for is Matthew Sweet sitting down with Colin Baker for a conversation about the actor’s turbulent time as the Doctor on screen. No doubt this will also appear on a future release (both Tom Baker and Peter Davison’s sit-downs are to be found on their respective first seasons’ Blu-rays, so Old Sixy’s will probably show up on Season 21’s or 22’s), but for now we are treated to an hour with Bonnie Langford. Resisting the temptation to dwell on Langford’s colossal career outside Who, Sweet conducts another well-planned interview that really drills down into the actress’s subjective experiences working on the series. As well as revealing a couple of new titbits – being asked to scream in a particular key to segue into the cliffhanger’s howl-out, not speaking to Colin Baker after his departure simply because she didn’t have his telephone number – this feature also boasts an innovate yet apposite finale in which Sweet breaks out his long-since closeted tap shoes for a surprisingly theatrical finish.

Above: Janet Fielding gives a convincing performance on Breakfast Time (20th October 1986)

This release also makes room for a few other features that I don’t recall ever having seen on DVD, including the complete 1986 Christmas Quiz edition of Tomorrow’s World (which saw Colin Baker make his final appearance in costume as the Doctor, competing in an almost absurdly tame version of Would I Lie to You?) and excerpts from a late 1986 edition of Breakfast Time. The latter makes for hilarious viewing today, particularly if you watch it straight after The Doctor Who Cookbook Revisited, as it highlights the outrageous accent that Janet Fielding put on for the interview - her natural Aussie brogue is actually much closer to her character’s than the plums-in-gob RP that she adopted for Breakfast Time. Also included is the range’s first foreign language feature, duly subtitled, in the form of a complete episode of the popular French science show Temps X which delves behind the scenes of the “Mindwarp” section of The Trial of a Time Lord.

Another new feature exclusive to this release is raw studio and location footage – almost five hours’ worth of the stuff. The DVD range offered us its fair share of studio and location snippets, but these were generally edited to make them fit the DVD-9 format, as well as palatable - take the short-but-sweet Jurassic Larks on the Time-Flight DVD, for instance. Only the most dedicated fan is going to be able to make it all the way through this avalanche of ephemera, but it’s nice to own all the same, really tapping into the clever marketing idea of these collections building up one’s personal “Doctor Who archive”. 

Rounding out the new supplements are Old Sixy’s edition of The Doctors Revisited (a twenty-five minute précis of the Colin Baker era aimed squarely at Americans who’ve started watching since 2005), a 2013 interview with Colin Baker (which is especially fascinating today, given his early championing of a female Doctor – I wish I’d had his foresight); an eye-opening twenty-minute interview with Brian Blessed recorded in 2007 (in which he discusses his love for the show, being in the frame to play the second Doctor, and a nasty confrontation with the man who’d eventually be cast in his place); and the 1993 Colin Baker / Nicola Bryant Panopticon panel (in which Bryant recalls working on Blackadder’s Christmas Carol and Baker describes the ridiculous realities of working on a George Lucas production).

Above: Brian Blessed on his favourite TV programme... Doctor Who

It would be unwise to discount the classic special features, though, the sheer amount and high standard of which is overwhelming, even by today’s standards. Each of The Trial of a Time Lord’s four segments has its own talking-heads production featurette together with deleted and extended scenes, trailers and continuities, commentaries and production subtitles. The ‘making of’ documentaries are still as informative and entertaining as they were more than a decade ago, and the quality of the hour’s worth of deleted and extended material is surprisingly well-presented – there’s not a timecode in sight. Even the continuities feel a little bit more special than usual as they have been expanded to include pages of interest from mid-1980s’ Ceefax. 

“The key to how you play [the Doctor] is you at parties.” - John Nathan-Turner

Trials and Tribulations is just shy of being an hour long and it remains the definitive documentary on Colin Baker’s tenure. All the big players are on hand to share their thoughts and memories about the most tumultuous time in the series’ history, and the result is as shocking as it is comprehensive. Of course, the piece does focus just as much on the good times as it does on the bad, and it is as uplifting to hear Colin Baker and Nicola Bryant talk about their happy memories of the 1985 season as it is painful to see script editor Eric Saward and producer John Nathan-Turner’s feud endure beyond the grave.

Inevitably, the documentary takes an especially detailed look at the show’s hiatus, focusing on the reasoning behind Michael Grade’s decision to axe Doctor Who (or lack thereof) and Britain’s surprisingly intense reaction as its people demanded the programme’s return. Saward’s Slipback radio serial and the charity single “Doctor in Distress” (“A lot of talent making a crap record” - Ian Levine) are both explored too, as is the show’s profuse media coverage through shows as diverse as Wogan; Blue Peter; and Points of View, including certain appearances by a bearded, but otherwise fully costumed, Colin Baker. All the Season 23 media appearances are still available to watch separately in this set, and thanks to the detail provided in the accompanying booklet we now know exactly when they were each transmitted. It used to irritate me no end when the DVD booklets would often omit such a straightforward but relevant piece of information.

“It’s metatextual... Here is a cliffhanger for no other reason except that the story now demands one.” - Rob Shearman

Another highlight is the thirty-minute Now, Get Out of That which, as you’ll probably infer, examines Doctor Who’s renowned cliffhangers. Something of an ironic choice for inclusion alongside a serial remarkably light on proper cliffhangers, this programme is an absolute delight. It’s a real pleasure to hear three of my favourite Doctor Who writers (Nev Fountain, Joseph Lidster and Rob Shearman) discuss the best and worst in the series’ history, including the famous “metatextual” cliffhanger in Dragonfire which leaves the Doctor literally hanging off a cliff simply because his weekly twenty-five minutes are up.

Above: Old Sixy gets Stripped for Action in a graphic novel that he wrote himself, The Age of Chaos

The beefed-up twenty-two-minute edition of Now and Then also survives the change of medium, though given its age it might have been prudent to rename it Then and Then, or at least consider updating it where appropriate. The box set also imports a few special features from other old media, including the untransmitted French & Saunders parody shot using the trial courtroom set (first released on The Curse of Fatal Death VHS) together with the sixth Doctor’s instalments of Stripped for Action and Tomorrow’s Times (borrowed from The Twin Dilemma and special edition Vengeance on Varos DVDs, respectively). As the title suggests, Stripped for Action examines the Time Lord’s comic strip adventures, and Old Sixy’s days in ink seem to have been every bit as tumultuous as his time on television. They appear to have proven fruitful all the same, spawning enduring companion Frobisher and even seeing Colin Baker pen his own graphic novel, The Age of Chaos.

“It certainly made me able to cope with the likes of Michael Grade." - Colin Baker

Tomorrow’s Times, meanwhile, examines the media’s reaction to Doctor Who during what was arguably its most chaotic period. By far the most interesting instalment in the series, here Sarah Sutton paints a picture of a programme literally roasted to death by fickle, self-serving naysayers. Baker’s first season as the Doctor attracted some of the most vitriolic reviews that the series had ever received by that point, only for those writing the reviews to suddenly switch horses and launch a ‘Bring Back Doctor Who’ campaign when news of the series’ cancellation broke. Such preposterous media vacillation is brought into sharp focus by the dignified Baker, who puts the whole circus into context as he speaks to the broadsheets of the loss of his son to cot death syndrome, and the precious time that the hiatus would allow him to spend with his new baby daughter.
 

Above: Unboxing Doctor Who: The Collection - Season 23 [CLICK TO ENLARGE]



With only fourteen episodes to work with for this release, BBC Studios elected to keep the same six-BD-50 format (and price bracket) and use the additional space to present not just extended and alternate edits of every episode, but also a stand-alone version of the “Terror of the Vervoids” section of the serial which omits the courtroom material and boasts updated special effects. Ever since the rise of the DVD format, I’ve had a niggling issue with deleted scenes: it’s incredibly rare to see them integrated into the work from which they were cut. Viewed in isolation they are no more than curiosities, their worth limited to the light that they can shed post-humously. Here, though, we get to see that hour’s worth of excised material that was originally peppered across four DVDs brought to life in context. Even the shape of the story is altered in parts as the new and replacement scenes subtly influence those around them in the running order, greatly improving the season’s final two episodes in particular. 

Terror of the Vervoids is an even more interesting offering, in many ways. Whilst I’m no fan of this sub-story, I’ve always been intrigued by the Dickens-like idea that it’s a ghost of the Doctor’s future – an adventure that hasn’t happened yet, but is nonetheless influential in the here and now. This special edition takes a firm hold of the opportunity afforded to it to create a brand new serial for some imaginary long-lost season, even going so far as to adopt the unused alternate Season 23 title sequence (a clean copy of which is also included) to set it apart. For those of us who’ve followed Old Sixy and Mel into their Big Finish audio adventures, we now have a complete TV serial to slot in there amongst them – one buoyed by some decent CG effects and a newfound sense of pace, if still marred by, well, pretty much everything else from Vervoids to Bushes.


Above: Unboxing Doctor Who: The Collection - Season 23 [CLICK TO ENLARGE]

 

For me, the greatest pleasure of these Doctor Who Collection releases is that they give me an excuse to watch classic stories with my now eight-year-old daughter, who wouldn’t have looked twice at The Trial of a Time Lord had it not just arrived at our door clad in Lee Binding’s staggeringly beautiful artwork. I can’t stress enough how damned dazzling these sets are – I normally try to limit myself to steelbooks these days, but these lush, open-out troves really are a collector’s item in of themselves. Previous release’s discs may have suffered from quality control issues (Seasons 12 and 18 both had to issue replacement discs), but the same cannot be said of their packaging which has always been exquisite in every respect. I love that the new artwork starts from a near-white canvas, instead of the more obvious starscape; that the glossy and heavyweight booklets are housed in fold-out compartments adorned with even more magnificent artwork; I even love the contentious adoption of the Jodie Whittaker-era logo. It might infuriate those whose classic Who collections are abounding with the once ubiquitous TV Movie-era logo, but surely slick design has to take precedence over precedent?



Above: Unboxing Doctor Who: The Collection - Season 23 [CLICK TO ENLARGE]

My only slight disappointment with this release, and indeed its predecessors in the range, is the lack of a downloadable digital copy to accompany the discs. Admittedly this isn’t a small ask following UltraViolet’s demise at the end of July and the unmitigated failure of the stand-alone Season 12 digital release, but it’s maddening given that the technology and infrastructure is there to deliver this to consumers. Had the Season 12 digital release been made available in HD (which I gather red tape prevents, given that much of the “main feature” is upscaled), at a reasonable price (instead of a tenner or so more than the physical edition), and tagged with the same level of care that went into producing the Blu-ray booklet (which could have also been included as a PDF), then many collectors might not have had to shell out hundreds of pounds for the second-hand set on eBay.

 

Of course, there will be some foolish folk out there who buy this box set primarily to watch the season of television that all of the content above is, technically, supplementary to. Needless to say, I’m not one of them, though I do welcome the upgrade in quality. As you might expect, on Blu-ray Trial looks better than it has ever done, though it has to be said that any gain in resolution is countered by the increase in new televisions’ sizes over the past eleven years. As with the classic Red Dwarf Blu-rays that I looked at earlier this year, these episodes look absolutely stunning on the 26” TV upstairs, but on our big 4K model the overall impression is similar to watching the DVDs on the little upstairs telly. Some moments sparkle of course – the opening shot, culled from the original film elements, looks absolutely fabulous, and the title sequences with their recreated credits are incredibly sharp even when blown up well beyond their intended proportions. As ever though, you can’t invent resolution. You can’t create fidelity. This upscale provides us with the best possible means to carry these episodes into the next era of television, looking much as they always did – just a lot bigger.

“And when I have finished, this
court will demand your life!”

The story of The Trial of a Time Lord has always confounded me, forcing my features through the sort of grotesque contortions usually reserved for those who eat one of Dave Lister’s triple-fried egg, chilli and mango chutney sandwiches. Conceptually, it’s ingenious – you really have to admire the gumption of the production team taking an under-fire show and literally putting it on trial in the first place, but to then take that trial and use it as a springboard to deliver some of the series’ most devastating and controversial moments is nothing short of inspirational. Peri’s fate as it is shown at the end of Part 8 got much more of a visceral reaction from my eight-year-old than either “Face the Raven” or “World Enough and Time” did, while the revelation of the Valeyard’s true identity made her leap to her feet as she did when John Hurt’s Warrior first revealed himself at the end of “The Name of the Doctor”. 

 

Another great strength of Trial is its unique structure, which by its nature eschews the principal problem faced by the series’ other long-running serials. Though linked together by the courtroom drama of the Doctor’s trial, this is a fourteen-part serial in name only - twelve of its fourteen parts comprise separate four-part stories by different writers that are presented as evidence in the over-arching trial, with the concluding two parts resolving the season-long arc in a two-parter that’s more focused on action than legality. Most imaginatively of all, though, the three four-part stories are gathered from Old Sixy’s relative past, present and future, serving as a lovely homage to Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol while also allowing the production team to push the envelope even further, exploring the ramifications of pulling the Doctor out of a yet-to-be-resolved adventure or even offering us a window into his personal future.

Indeed, the ideas driving this fourteen-part behemoth are every bit as bold and alluring as those propping up many a modern arc. Their implementation, however, is patchy at best. Few Doctor Who stories start more impressively than this one does - the opening shot of the TARDIS being brought aboard Space Station Zenobia was, at eight grand, the single most expensive shot in the show’s history at that point, and to this day that investment continues to pay off. Dominic Glynn’s new, darker arrangement of the theme music (which was cobbled together in a week, apparently) segues beautifully into his just as illustrious “Trial Theme” and a shot reminiscent of the first Star Wars movie in how it boldly proclaims, “We mean business now.” From there, though, the proceedings take something of a nosedive.

 

To me, the story’s greatest selling point is the trial itself. I’ve always been profoundly disappointed with the end of The War Games, in which the second Doctor’s trial on Gallifrey struggles to fill a single episode, and so the prospect of a more detailed examination of Gallifreyan jurisprudence is a salivating one. Yet the Gallifreyan legal system is riddled with absurdities that can’t simply be explained away as alien, particularly when its court is so clearly modelled on a British courtroom which brings with it a number of unshakeable expectations.

There is no indictment. The prosecution can thrown in fresh charges on a whim (“Genocide!”) and even speak for the judge on sentencing matters, evidently just because it makes for a good cliffhanger. For his part, the defendant interjects with more regularity than the prosecution does - and more often than not it’s to complain about the violent content of the evidence presented. It may be sublime satire, but it makes a mockery of the supposed setup and erodes any sense of veracity. Even the captivating performances of Colin Baker, Michael Jayston and Lynda Bellingham don’t quite manage to obscure the farcical fluidity and procedural injustices of Gallifreyan law.

 

Away from Zenobia, things don’t improve much. As Mark Strickson points out from upon the sofa (as opposed to behind it, tellingly), “The Mysterious Planet” limb of the narrative is a visual washout. The location is drab and uninspiring to match the personalities of Joan Sims’ savages, while those dwelling underground look like walking condoms. Even the L1 robot is a spectacular failure; perhaps the most utterly feeble and unthreatening creation ever seen in Doctor Who. Fortunately Robert Holmes’ scripts are ultimately saved by their wry humour, which blends Douglas Adams-style gags with Peri wisecracks that are unexpectedly funny (I love the one about multiple husbands – “We tend to have them one at a time...”) and the season-stealing double act of Glitz (Tony Selby) and Dibber (Glen Murphy). Dastardly and selfish, these two men really make “The Mysterious Planet” episodes worth watching. Intelligent, verbose and comfortable in his own crooked skin, Glitz’s “Arthur Daley in space” is possibly the greatest recurring character of the 1980s, and Holmes’ script is littered with razor sharp dialogue for the actor to relish.

 

Philip Martin’s contribution to the season marks a definite change in tone. The autumnal daylight of “The Mysterious Planet” gives way to blacks, pinks and dirty greens as a remarkably effective little bit of Paintbox magic brings the colourful skies of Thoros Beta to life. But even these the vivid images of ocean and sky are short-lived as Martin’s dark tale takes place predominantly underground, where the sonorous voice of Brian Blessed’s warrior King Yrcanos echoes around the Mentors’ chambers in six channels.

Every variant of every episode of Trial included in this box set can be viewed either with their original mono soundtrack or a new 5.1 surround sound mix, but these “Mindwarp” episodes are where the surround sound really comes into its own, and not just because of Old Grampy Rabbit’s booming vocals. The crashing of an alien sea, the cacophonous cackling of Nabil Shaban’s inimitable Sil – the surround really does add an extra layer here. We should be particularly grateful for it too, as, due to the loss of the original incidental music elements, to produce it BBC Studios had to commission an all-new score from Richard Hartley, whose music can also be enjoyed in isolation on a separate track (as can the original composers’ on the other eight episodes). Purists need not fret, though – Hartley’s original score remains inviolate in the original mono mix.

What’s interesting about the “Mindwarp” section of Trial is that even now, decades later, it’s unclear exactly what was intended and by whom. In this collection, Colin Baker takes the credit – or blame, as the case may be – for questioning the Doctor’s behaviour (and by extension Peri’s fate) as it’s depicted, leading to the afterthought retcon in Part 14 which sits painfully at odds with both what’s shown on screen and any sense of drama. On its own, “Mindwarp” is fascinating; even provocative. Many of the Valeyard’s allegations are clearly made out here, albeit with mitigating circumstances. As viewers, we know that the Doctor could never be cruel or cowardly... yet, he did try to kill Peri in a post-regenerative fit, so he’s got form. Worse, as he has no memory of these events he can’t convincingly repudiate the charges levelled against him. It gives the viewer pause – pause that is crucial in sustaining the momentum as the season enters its second half.

“As a matter of interest, where is Peri?” - The Doctor

Unfortunately, the resolution – such as it is – is unsatisfactory in every sense, as the Merseyside Branch of the Doctor Who Appreciation Society were keen to point out in the notorious 8th December 1986 edition of Open Air that's included in full in this collection. As the very young Chris Chibnall and his buddies were keen to point out, none of the issues raised in “Mindwarp” are paid off or even explained. To this day we still don’t know for certain whether the Doctor’s mind was addled by Crozier’s machine, whether the Doctor’s behaviour was all part of a big rouse, or whether the evidence presented had simply been tampered with. Eric Saward and Colin Baker maintain the latter, whereas I favour the clever gambit option, but in the commentary Philip Martin goes on record and states that in his view everything shown here actually happened and that the Doctor’s mind had indeed been affected by Crozier's machine (it seems “Mindwarp” was something of a clue...) so we are no further forward. Whatever was supposed to have happened, it just goes to show what a complete hash was made of things by the production team when the script editor and writer had very different views as to what the story was fundamentally about. It’s a miracle, frankly, that the “Mindwarp” episodes make for the compulsive viewing that they do. In part, I think that this is down to these events leaving viewers focusing on consequence rather than mechanics. In another of the serial’s defining moments, the Time Lords pull the Doctor out of time before he has the opportunity to put things right.

“Alive within this oh so wonderful, wonderful frame!” - Kiv

Seeing Kiv awaken inside Peri’s body, one can really empathise with the Doctor. Yes, he was meddling in affairs that didn’t necessarily concern him, but I believe that he could have made things right were it not for the Time Lords’ interference. And what really stings is that his lofty peers didn’t pull him out of time because at that specific moment he had finally crossed over a line in the sand or broken the camel’s back (the final straw came just after Synthespians™, according to Craig Hinton’s 2004 novel) - they intervened when they did because Crozier’s experiments had gone far enough to threaten their universal hegemony. Peri’s apparent death is made all the more tragic by the fact that it could have been prevented so easily.

On the 2008 DVD, as I watched Pip and Jane Baker being crucified on Open Air by Chibnall and company, I really felt sorry for the two writers. I almost felt bad for giving a lot of their work such a hard time myself. And then I watched their “Terror of the Vervoids” episodes again, and any feelings of guilt were swiftly expunged.

 

“I’m truthful, honest, and about as boring
as they come.” You said it, Mel.

This time around though, I also saw their story through my daughter’s eyes, and to my astonishment she was transfixed by the bright and colourful Agatha Christie for kiddies, if not the eponymous Vervoids, whose terror wasn’t particularly obvious even thirty-odd years ago. More importantly though, she found herself a new character to identify with in Bonnie Langford’s Melanie Bush - the energetic and exuberant do-gooder that has utterly failed to ever make any sort of positive impression on me. After finishing our viewing marathon, I watched in disbelief as my eldest child replaced our LEGO Clara’s hairpiece with Princess Merida’s (the closest she could get to Mel’s ginger curls, see) and then at bedtime asked if I had any “listen tos” (audiobooks) with Mel in. As I write this, she’s lay in bed, happily kept awake by The Wrong Doctors. It seems that there was merit in JNT’s madness after all.

The revered Robert Holmes passed away after having only completed the first eleven minutes of Trial’s thirteenth episode and some preliminary notes for the fourteenth. The story was originally planned to end a knife-edge cliffhanger, with the Doctor and the Valeyard locked in Holmes and Moriarty-style mortal combat, the series’ uncertain future reflected in its protagonist’s. Eric Saward eventually completed the serial from Holmes’s notes, but unfortunately he had a major disagreement with JNT that saw him leave the series, taking his script for Part 14 with him. And, just like that, the ending of Trial sank into the quicksand quicker than Old Sixy at the end of Part 13.

 

“The Valeyard is an amalgamation of the darker sides of your nature, somewhere between your twelfth and final incarnation, and I must say you do not improve with age.” - The Master

What should have been a suspenseful and climactic finale descends into a kitschy runaround inside the Matrix. Why on Earth the sickeningly bureaucratic Mr Popplewick was thrown into the mix I’ll never understand; after twelve episodes of verbal sparring, could the production team not see that we wanted to see more of Colin Baker and Michael Jayston’s Pertwee / Delgado anti-affinity, not a pen-pushing Valeyard wearing a rubber mask? 

“I should have stayed here. The oldest civilization. Decadent. Degenerate. And rotten to the core. Ten million years of absolute power, that’s what it takes to be really corrupt.” - The Doctor



Even the finale’s most exultant moments fall flat. The Doctor’s scathing speech on Gallifrey, which might mark Colin Baker’s most outstanding moment as the Doctor on TV, eventually leads to the deposition of the High Council... and the prompt election of a new one. The impact of “Mindwarp” is completely negated by the news of Peri’s survival. To undo her death but not bring her back into the series seems pointless in the extreme; just a knee-jerk reaction to a bit of bad press, or, as Colin Baker puts it, “Absolute schlock”. The finale is circular, neat and utterly devoid of any meaning. Only Anthony Ainley’s Master offers us anything new or remarkable, and that’s only because he realises that the Valeyard’s utter lack of scruples makes him much more of a threat to him than the Doctors that he knows.

Just after attending a publicity session with Bonnie Langford to promote Trial, Colin Baker was inauspiciously fired. His Doctor’s parting words would not be, “It’s the end, but the moment has been prepared for...” or, “A tear, Sarah Jane?”, but rather “Carrot Juice! Carrot Juice! Carrot Juice!” For Old Sixy, I’m afraid, that says it all.

“It’s impossible. I hate it. It’s evil. It’s astonishing...

I want to kiss it to death.”

- The Doctor, “Under the Lake” (2015)

It’s hard to judge a serial as long and as varying in quality as this one is. Eric Saward’s courtroom drama, though legally spurious, still manages to captivate, but the quality of the evidence presented varies wildly. Were Doctor Who a 1980s US sci-fi drama series, then The Trial of a Time Lord would probably have taken the form of a twenty-six week clip show, the bulk of the evidence presented being lifted from previously broadcast stories. And with hindsight, that may have been a mercy.

It speaks volumes, then, that Season 23 is the highlight of the Who-ray range thus far. A murky and troubled serial is companion to a joyful and celebratory collection of all-new features and serious, insightful documentaries that help us to understand, and perhaps even come to terms with, The Trial of a Time Lord.

Doctor Who: The Collection – Season 23 is available now on Blu-ray, with today’s cheapest retailers being Amazon and Zoom, who are each offering it for £38.99 with free delivery. If you are interested in this release, or any other in this range, I’d encourage you to place an order as soon as possible to avoid disappointment. Whilst I’m sure these box sets will get a repressing in the future in more standardised packaging, these sets with “limited edition packaging” have been selling out very quickly and then going on to change hands for a small fortune on eBay.

Sections of this review have previously been published on Doctor Who: The History of the Doctor in October 2008,  October 2009 and October 2012.