Doctor Who: Season 17 (1979-80). Shada-day Night Fever
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- Опубліковано 15 лип 2024
- #DoctorWho #TomBaker
Stam Fine looks at the 17th Season of Doctor Who, the making of which was by all accounts a bag of hurt all round. This was Tom Baker's sixth year of playing The Doctor, assisted by a newly regenerated Romana (Lalla Ward) and together they faced off against the Daleks, a man with a split personality, a giant gangrenous gonad, and strike action. This year saw the series garner its highest viewing figures, but with a lot of tension behind the scenes, culminating in the season finale being cancelled halfway through production. This is also the season that Douglas Adams- at that time a radio comedy writer- became the show's script editor just as his career as the creator of Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy was about to explode.
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Introduction
1:30 Romana II and K9
3:25 Destiny of the Daleks
7:04 Movellan Right Along
8:41 City of Death
12:32 Creature From The Pit
14:17 Nightmare on Eden
16:38 Horns of Nimon
19:46 Shada
23:28 The End of the 1970's - Розваги
". . . and Lalla Ward, dressed as a schoolgirl." Good enough for me!
Right? She's as cute as a button x3 And really belonged to Dr. Who. We were all soooo freaking lucky.
And me!
Lalla Ward is a Gorgeous lady, doesn't matter what she wore she always looked stunning.😍
Tom: Hey they got former Bond girl and Space 1999 fav Catherine Schell to be in this story. She’s really something.
Lalla: Looks like it’s time for the schoolgirl outfit.
Perverts.
I love that line, "you're a beautiful woman...probably.." that's just so Tom Baker! LoL No one else can get away with that line.
I lived in Deptofrd in a flat just across from Lalla and Tom and Tom was so nice to us kids and used to leave chocolate bars in the lobbies and other treats
It was good to see them in real life and watch them on the TV . Tom was very flamboyant and llla very beautiful
Lalla Ward and her overbite made up for a hell of a lot of season 17 (&18) sins. Tom's cutest companion.
Tom Baker thought so too since he eventually married Ms Ward.😊
Ah, City of Death! I showed this to my older brother back when I was a kid and turned him into a fan immediately. He thought it was clever and hilarious (and even showed it to his friends). And I felt wonderful for introducing him to it and changing his mind about a show he never previously liked that much.
A time when white men could make pop culture in their own countries and not be hated for it. Alas that time is past.
@@TheBelrick lol wut?
@@TheBelrick , Doctor Who's first producer was a woman, Verity Lambert and was instrumental in the creation of the tv series!
@@mathewguglielmi8451 Wonderful, hundreds of people involved . white men. but lets of course talk about a wahman.
@@TheBelrick , Verity Lambert and Sidney Newman, the Canadian tv producer , appointed to work at the BBC, were instrumental in conceptualising the show. The television movie, Adventures in Space and Time, produced for the 50th anniversary, dramaticised this really well. Verity Lambert then went on to have a very accomplished career and set up her own production company, Cinema Verity. So, no the concept for Doctor Who was not the creation of white men.
Daleks and the Bee Gees, the perfect combination 😂😂
City of Death is one of my all time favourites
I honestly had no idea how much I needed more singing Daleks in my life until I stumbled on this channel.
Ouch,when they broke into Staying Alive that made me laugh,which made me cough,which really hurts at the moment because I'm recovering from chest internal bruising following a car crash a week ago. But I'm still glad I watched it.
I had to stop the video so I could laugh and not miss anything. Oh, Stam. You're great.
^^this 😊
This was the era of Doctor Who that I was introduced to. I never tried to criticize the props and " special effects" of the show as I understood that they would be far from state of the art. I just enjoyed the stories and the acting.
Exactly, yes. What should be the way. Dr Who was never famous for its amazing effects, the special effects were notoriously cheaply done, and its budget was never that big, but they used what they had and often achieved admirable results. The fun was in the show itself, the stories and how they did it with such a small budget.
City of Death ranks amongst my favorite Tom Baker era episodes. The others were Pyramids of Mars and Taleons of Whei Chaing. Catherine Shell gives suitably convincing performance as the Contessa. But, i just loved actor played Count utterly ruthless yet charming. " The centuries that divide me shall be undone!"
Honestly one of my favorite seasons
Personally, my guilty pleasure for this season is "The Creature from the Pit." I find it hysterical. The Lady Adrasta is a real hoot.
Personally, I don't understand why this season gets the hate it gets. It's hilarious. I guess you just have to be a certain type of person to like hammy acting and silly humor.
I liked that one, although it's uneven. Particularly the "monster" turning out to be a good person.
I too like 'The Creature From the Pit'. It was good fun. If you played a drinking game out of how many times Adrasta shouts "Kill them!" throughout the episode you'd slide right off the couch in a stupor by the time it's over.
@@veteran0121 Hmmm, I dunno. The whole "enjoying the hammy performances and shaky effects" thing is one of the (many) reasons that I've always adored Classic Who, but I think one "so bad it's (maybe) good" story after another in succession in s17 really does take it's toll. Yes 'City of Death' is rightfully much loved; 'Destiny of the Daleks' is basically "Daleks - more of the same" in both good and "seen it all before" ways, but with 'Shada' having never originally been completed, things do badly suffer from three sub-par "oh go on, laugh at how bad it is" stories in a row (decent script 'Nightmare on Eden' also being let down in other areas) does really take it's toll IMO.
Looking back, I think it would have been EVEN MORE HILARIOUS if, when he got down into the pit, Tom Baker would have found Geoffrey Bayldon playing WILLIAM HARTNELL. The 1st Doctor would have been the only character in the universe who could have put the 4th Doctor in his place.
"What are YOU doing here? I don't remember this AT ALL!" "Still suffereing from a bit of amnesia? I don't wonder." "...............WHAT???" (some of this stuff just writes itself) 😆
Destiny of the Daleks was the first ever Who story I remember watching as a child, so will forever be special to me. That's makes the Lalla Ward cliffhanger special too, also my first.
Season 17 is one of my all time top fave seasons and has three stories that are in my top 10.
Destiny of the Daleks, City of Death and Shada.
Horns of Nimon is crazy funny too 😁
The villain in 'Horns of Nimon' is one of my all-time, over the top favorites! What a crazy git. 'City of Death' also was great. The location shooting gave it a unique and much more produced look and when the pieced together 'Shada' became available I bought it right away. As a Douglas Adams fan I always liked his Doctor Who stories. The BBC version of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy was fun. Much more so than the most recent film adaptation with Martin Freeman. I was disappointed with the result. It failed to capture Adams' quirkiness like the BBC series did. I thought, anyway.
Graham Crowden (Soldeed) is the only remotely good thing about 'Horns', he plays it so insanely over the top that at least he injects some much needed colour into an otherwise shoddy and drab story. In all truth Crowden and the character deserved a better serial to be utilised in, as little else about 'Horns' works at all. It's been tried to be excused as a "pantomime" which it clearly is not, the whole "it's actually a comedy" excuse had already been way overplayed at this point (see also: 'The Creature from the Pit'). S17 is a season badly lacking in enough solid stories to make up for the line of subpar lesser stories, and the whole thing sadly feels very tired and half-hearted. The Fourth Doctor is my favourite of all Doctors, but sitting through three dud stories in a row ('Nightmare of Eden' has an okay script but again the production lets things down) can try the patience of even the most dedicated of viewers. 'Shada' does thankfully raise the bar a bit, but having never been completed, 'Horns' is (or was) a very disappointing note to close the season on.
City of Death and Shada were Douglas Adams stories and I dig 'em too. Oh yeah. When they released Shada with the missing scenes filled in with animation I immediately snatched it up, eager to see the full story. Horns of Nimon had one of the best antagonists of all-time. Wish I had that episode. That actor was so over the top it was incredible fun to watch.
@@briansands9957 They were indeed both penned by Douglas Adams, and a definate step up from the previous season's 'Pirate Planet', which I didn't find too bad but adore as much as many seem to; I felt it suffered a bit too much from the "Bob Baker & Dave Martin syndrome", of having too many "big ideas" crammed into one script and not completely working as a result, IMO. Adams was a good Script Editor, injecting some genuine wit into the scripts after some of the misjudged "funny" shenanigans seen over the previous couple of years, but was a double-edged sword - he's good for this one season (before he left to concentrate on 'Hitchhikers') but I'm not sure how well his style would have fitted the series more long-term. The villain from 'Horns' on hindsight is maybe the best thing from that misjudged story, and deserved a better serial to be used in. The tone of that story was so all over the place that it's hard to know just how to take it.
It's taken me days to watch this, I keep wetting my pants and having to change them. But, you're spot on with your analysis. I love Dr Who.
My favorite season. No, I'm not being ironic.
Looks like Destiny of the Daleks used the same outside quarry area as Blakes 7 "Games" episode. i recognise a couple of exact spots they used .
I can't wait until you get into the revived series. Oh yeah. Especially Peter Capaldi's run. I loved him as the Doctor. He made the character a grumpy, ill-tempered chap with numerous references to his days in a long scarf. I liked an older Doctor after years of Tennent and Smith. He was better than he got credit for.
Capaldi is the best actor to ever play the doctor.
I'm down with that assessment. But ya gotta state why you think this. Well...I mean, you don't HAVE to but I'd like to know why you say this. He's in my top 3, definitely.
Capaldi definitely reminded me of Tom Baker's Doctor. Though some aspects were even more amped-up, such as going from not being able to discern human beauty standards to barely recognising any humans, seemingly treating us as interchangeable. (Or maybe he just wanted them to think that!)
I laughed out loud in Creature in The Pit episode when the rebel leader is stabbed and describes the type of steel of the knife he got stabbed with as his last words.
It’s a testament to the quality of your videos that I can disagree strongly with your opinions of this season, and still enjoy every minute of your analysis. Brilliant work as always.
15:44 - This is the part where Professor Tryst's assistant, Della, gets shot in the throat, but she clutches her stomach as she falls to the floor! 🤣🤣🤣
I nearly prolapsed with laughter when Stayin’ Alive sung by the Daleks came on 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
i like episode about the tardis where he gets to go through all thev doors in the tardis
This was an awesome season and I loved it.
Staying Alive Dalek version . . . Perfect
That noise from the Tardis @ 18:18 (Horns of Nimon) is actually a classic sound FX borrowed from BBC's "The Goon Show" radio comedy show.
My favourite part is where a weekly publication can do well enough to be published less often
"HOW MANY NIMON HAVE YOU SEEN TODAY? HOW MANY NIMON?!"
I love your cut in quips. They are actually funny.
Tom Baker goes to Paris and Cambridge !
Destiny of the Dulleks is a story I still haven't been able to watch all the way through.
Another fine round up of the season in question - as a note the second forbidden planet shop that opens in London had a Nimon head on top of one of the rotating racks - it also had a dalek as it was the film and tv shop - long before it became a corporate franchise
I'm surprised no one thought of doing a Doctor Who album. Imagine signing Daleks , Tom Baker and Lala Ward doing duets together.
I loved this season. Sure it was hokey and the effects were comical, but I loved these two together. T.B. was my first and still favorite doctor. It's why I still watch Doctor Who (up to this last one anyway).
IIRC, they damaged the light on the top of the Police Box prop moving it to a filming location and had it replace it with that makeshift flashing blue light due to time constraints.
Lalla Ward was just about the ultimate posh totty
I have to admit that I really like the Creature/Nightmare/Nimon Trilogy - in fact, I'm quite fond of the whole Season. Despite moments of over-the-top melodrama, it still works due to Tom and Lalla's committed performances, and supporting actors that "get it", too (including Graham Crowden). Contrast this with Sylvester's first Season, which was similarly OTT, but felt more like an amateur pantomime.
Sylvester McCoy's first season is not one of my favourites.
@@StamFine Nor mine - in fact, it's my least favourite of all.
Sylvester's first season wasn't good, but with him the show went up again - and then was cancelled. Tom went the other way: Hinchcliffe era was probably the best time of the show, and when Williams took over, the show slowly declined.
@@Nikioko Agreed, although I'd extend the Golden Age of the show to include the Letts/Dicks era as well. McCoy's last two seasons marked a real return to form, and it's a shame he didn't get one or two more.
@@ftumschk The Golden Era is seasons 7-14. Barry Letts and Philip Hinchcliffe. And 60s Doctor Who (especially Troughton's tenure) was always better than 80s Doctor Who. McCoy was on a good way back in Season 26, but unfortunately the damage to the show was already beyond repair.
The movellans reminded me of an off shoot of glam disco bands like “Boney M” or “Earth, Wind & Fire”
@7:07 Disco Daleks with a #1 song Staying Alive
Destiny is the first Who story I remember, way back in 79. I was five then but I'll never forget Lalla Ward being trapped in that shaft, DALEKs trying to break through the wall to exterminate her.
Loved the review, looking forward to the next.
One of my earliest memories was Davros getting frozen in Destiny
@@StamFine It's weird how memories like that stay with you through the years
That Dalek cover of the Bee Gees... I'm subscribing...
Awesome! Thank you!
Most Dalek voices over a few seconds I find grating, so thanks for the Dalek disco song! Thanks for the videos!!! 📺📺📺
I always wondered how maintain that level of fingernails scrapping over blackboard. I would have lost my voice trying imitation.
Love tom baker he's best doctor who..and ramana wow .
Have to admit I loved Destiny of the Dalek and City Of Death. Destiny is still one of my all time favourites. Loved the whole desperate race against the odds with the Daleks and the Movellans. A lot of the rest of the season was a bit iffy though. BTW, A Dalek version of staying alive...perfection!!!! :)
Romana's outfit in City of Death is so cute.
Thank You for another year of videos
Terry @ Tardis Spider
Doctor Who 1963-1996 is the best! Period! And Tom Baker IS the Sean Connery of DW!
That just means the actor could withstand good and bad stuff by ability alone, not that the stuff was good.
Destiny of the Daleks. Creature from the Pit and Horns of Nimon are my favorite Series 17 stories.
Nightmare of Eden is the greatest Doctor Who story ever told. Change my mind.
I know Destiny of the Daleks gets bashed regularly, but it is one of my favourites! Actually, this whole season is a fav from childhood! Lalla Ward was probably the first adult TV girl I thought was cute (I was very young then, and most of the girls I found attractive on TV were closer to my age)
Me too, she was my first crush! Absolutely button-cute, and she dressed to match!:)
Loved it. Nightmare OF Eden!
Can't wait till the next one!
10:28 6th Doctor's coat: hi
Great commentary, so many good lines, ‘As scary as a tax return.’ 😂 Been an avid classic Who fan forever and got this ordered on Blu-ray: an odd season for me as I’ve only ever seen City of Death and can’t really remember the others. Just got to see this full season, even if it is - or maybe because - it infamously splits the fan base. I’m just happy to have classic who. Earned yourself a sub!👌
The Boney M Appreciation Society
Lol 🤣😂😂
Your timing was excellent as I needed a good laugh.
As always a great review. 👍 👌
My father was diagnosed with Parkinson's in the morning and possible pancreatic cancer in the afternoon so this took my mind off it after a stressful day . . . 🤷♂️
I hope thing turn out well for your dad.
@@StamFine 😃👍
best series/season ever!
I remember reading that JNT did try to get Shada finished but wasn't able to. To be fair can you imagine how difficult it would have been to try to get all the original actors free at the same time after the original booking dates were over and they were all off on other jobs?
City of death is my favorite episode of classic who
Lalla Ward is so cute
I love season 17!
Lewis Fiander was a family friend (he passed away in 2016) and had a booming deep voice (there is some audio interviews with him on UA-cam where you can hear what he sounded like normally). I asked him about Trask and he said the accent was developed with Baker because they'd both been talking and decided that people living elsewhere in time and space wouldn't have "Earth accents".
Boney M? "Rasputin" is an all time great! Nice to hear a namedrop!
Then you put in the Bee Gees...
Coffee ☕ spits onto keyboard
I like it!
Say what you want about Soldeed but man, I have a soft spot for cheesy cartoonish villains like that, he kinda reminds me of that guy from the 90's Dungeons and Dragons movie, so hilarious bad it's kinda cool.
"My dreeeEAAmss of conQUEst" is a line that lives up forever in my mind.
Oh, the puns, the puns.
The story I always heard was that JN-T DID try and finish Shada, but the BBC repeatedly said no and in any case most of the cast had gone on and accepted other projects. He still seemed to have a bee in his bonnet about it because it was him who got the story patched up for its VHS release in the early 90s.
Lala Ward was so pretty!
I loved the radio play version of Adams' first Dirk Gently book. It was amazingly cast. Dirk Gently had a voice like Jon Pertwee and the mannerisms of Tom Baker. Professor Chronotis sounded much like William Hartnell. And although this was certainly coincidental, Dirk's secretary reminded me very much of Catharine Tate's early Donna Noble in The Runaway Bride.
The Count, was actually General Veers, from the Empire Strikes Back!👍🏽
The past explained, the future foretold, the present largely apologized for.
What is the song at 15:26 ? I hear it in your videos a lot, and it makes me laugh everytime😂 keep up the good work, Stam Fine, really enjoy your work
Oooo Mr La-de-da eating at Byron Burgers. Whimpey not good enough for you?
This season is fun, but it's kind of the polar opposite to certain more recent seasons which tried to take themselves far too seriously and utterly flunked. City of Death is the obvious standout, but I do personally like Nightmare of Eden. It was the first, and still the only, story to really tackle drug addiction, and despite the pantomime comedy, it still somehow manages to get its message across.
You are TV quality and under-represented.
Script editor for Season 17: The Douglas Adams. Yes that one. He wrote City of Death which is my favourite all time Doctor Who story.
The production quality and budget were terrible but this is still my favourite all time season of Doctor Who - the dialogue and ideas sparkle (even if the execution doesn't). And Lalla Ward...
I feel like most of this season was skipped on PBS in the US. I only remember 2 of stories.
I was in the Tumblr Classic Who fandom many years ago and some genius made a remix of "my dreams of CON-QUEST!" and "WHAT?! no not the mind probe!!", which is just a masterpiece.
That aside, I do enjoy that a sliiiiightly better new series episode (The God Complex) has a pretty freaky monster that was referenced as a cousin of the Nimon.
Remixes involving vocal samples from classic sci-fi is one of my favourite.. well I won't call it a genre unto itself, but I'll call it a recurring gag in other genres.
Although he was self-deprecating about his contributions, Graham Williams co-wrote City of Death with Douglas Adams and there's probably some material from David Fisher's first draft in there. It seems a little unfair to me to just call it Douglas Adams' work.
15:27 these monsters aren't that bad. They remind me of monsters of the week from Tokusatus show like kamen rider, ultraman and super sentai.
Honestly imo Mary Tamm was the better portrayal of Romana.
It's actually sad that it was a missed opportunity to develop her character, which is a big part of the reason why Mary Tamm didn't want to continue.
mY dReAms of CoNqUesT
DESTINY OF THE DALEKS is my favorite of Season 17.
Have to say remembering these episodes and rewatching them on Pluto tv these days you see everything your speaking about in your videos about how Good and Bad the episodes were then. These days people are so hard on the current Dr Who I sit and wonder if they have ever looked at Classic Who.
At least the classic Who actors could actually ACT.
Terry Nation wrote for Macgyver?
That would explain that time Macgyver met the Daleks!
(Season 2 Episode 1 The Human Factor. Check it out!)
lol!
My favorite Baker season. Only coming first, season 14
Another wonderful review of a full Doctor Who season. A fantastic video- you are awesome 🙏🏻👌. Can’t wait until the next one- thanks soooo much ♥️❤️
Thanks!
It puts flesh on the bare bones of what I'd read about the subsequent seasons and stories after I stopped watching it,so it's interesting to see for me and wittily and amusingly put together. Overall,though,and with City of Death an honorable exception,I still think I got out at roughly the right time at Image of the Fendahl.
I greatly respect Douglas Adams' body of work -- he was creative and sharp-edged and witty -- but I think his contributions to Who were jarring and not a good fit. The Shada script is probably the best exemplar of proto-Hitchhikers-wit and Tom-Baker-wit gelling; the rest aren't nearly so good, though City of Death succeeds on its own story merits, relying more on the antagonist than on our favorite Gallifreyan.
I love the fourth doctors era but I feel this season was way too comedic. And I feel it’s down to Douglas Adams.
Hitchhikers is my favourite book. But I feel his humour doesn’t work with DW.
Although City of Death is a masterpiece it should’ve been a one of comedy story.
This season definitely needed to take things more seriously.
(Guess I felt a lot writing this comment)
Lalla Ward dressed as a school girl.....
Destiny and Nimon aside, this is the best Doctor Who season ever.
Ok I actually blocked Horns of Nimon...
Yep I know I am into minority on this. But this is one of the first Doctor Who episodes I saw as a kid and I really liked it.
I'll take a bad Tom Baker DW than anything they put out since David Tennant
Do me a favour please Stam, please release all your Dalek songs in full for download. I need to have these!!!
Lalla Ward amazes me as while she's much CUTER than Mary Tamm, she is also more confident and "imperial"-- in other words, more like a "Time Lord". In the long run, however, I do often wish Mary Tamm had stayed and been shown to evolve in that same fashion. Also in the long run, I prefer season 17 to 18, 19, 20, 21, 22 and 23. and yes, it IS absolutely criminal that JNT didn't finish "Shada" as the first thing he did when he took over. And deciding to surgically remove ALL sense of humor was a HUGE mistake. (Not to mention, he determination not to hire ANY established writers... because it was easier to boss around new ones.)
I've long felt the villain in "Nightmare In Eden" was actually channelling Peter Sellers from "WHAT'S NEW PUSSYCAT".
A police officer saw a diamond shape UFO in 1986 ……… he drew the exact same spacecraft seen here
Controversial opinion. The trick to watching 'Horns of Nimon' is to view it as a comedy.
Love destiny of the Daleks and shada
As a kid, the ropey effects and over the top acting were less noticeable and this was a good season, just too short. City of Death was actually quite boring to kid me, who didn’t appreciate the fine cast, quality acting, and Lalla Ward dressed as a schoolgirl.
Destiny of the daleks is one of the best episodes ever
McLaren and Don Brennan 🤣