Customer Reviews

Doctor Who - Colony in Space [VHS]

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Whether you agree or disagree with the overall story being good or bad, this is still a good way to get your Jon Pertwee/Katy Manning fix. I first saw this on PBS, luckily one episode each Saturday, in 1976.

This is probably the weakest story of this particular season, although it promised a lot by being the first Pertwee adventure away from Earth. I think that too many elements were added for this story (Master, colonists, mining company, natives, Doomsday Weapon...eliminating something from it actually would have created more interest). The ending of Episode 2 is actually a fun cliffhanger.
It was fun to note that Jo Grant's reaction in the TARDIS was no different than most of the other companions before her (bigger inside than out, NOT ON EARTH, OH MY!).

Jo Grant (the Doctor's assistant) is taken on a trip in the TARDIS for the first time (in a wonderful sequence that encourages the viewer feel her excitement). The planet they arrive on is seriously drab though, and once they've arrived, the story begins to ramble a little over the course of three hours. (Amazon.com has already provided a tidy plot summary, so I won't detail it here.) Even by DOCTOR WHO standards, the effects and sets are amazingly cheap. It's reccomended only to the serious enthusiast of that peculiar genre of "British Telefantasy". But the story is solid, the characters are easy to get attached to, and it won't insult your intelligence. It's a diverting three hours or so, even if it doesn't wind up being DOCTOR WHO at its best.

The Time Lords use the Doctor to investigate the barren planet Uxarieus, where the powerful Interplanetary Mining Corporation is pressuring a group of colonists to vacate the mineral-rich planet. Intrigue, murder, and deception abound while the Doctor and Jo uncover an awesome power buried deep within an ancient city...
Spoilers follow. This Jon Pertwee story is not remembered for much beyond it being the first Third Doctor story where the character leaves Earth. As a change of pace, 'Colony In Space' may have been refreshing when it first aired, but in comparison to other Doctor Who stories (most of them set on other worlds), there is not too much in this padded 6-parter that stands out. The plot involving scheming mining officers and the bland colonists is insufficient to fill out over 2 hours of story, but a few actors, particularly those playing the chief miners, gamely put their all into their limited roles. The plot gets more interesting once the ever-reliable Roger Delgado again shows up as the Master (posing as an Adjudicator), but only slightly. The final storyline about the struggle to control an ancient doomsday weapon is cliched but necessary to give this story an extra bit of kick. Jon Pertwee, Katy Manning and Delgado are as delightful as usual and obviously the foremost reasons to purchase this video, one of the last Pertwees not yet released commercially. For all the roundabout storytelling with characters escaping from capture only to wind up imprisoned again to kill time, and the campy aliens and robots, fans of this show and these actors will probably enjoying seeing 'Colony In Space' again for the first time in a long while.

Not the best of the "all-Master" season but notable for a couple of things. It's the first off-world trip for the Doctor since his exile to Earth at the beginning of the Pertwee era and, therefore the first TARDIS ride for his companion Jo Grant.
It's also the first time we see the Doctor meet the Master in an alien setting. The tables are turned since the Doctor doesn't have the automatic authority of UNIT behind him and must try to convince the locals that the Master, who is impersonating a government official, is up to no good. To them the Master is the one with credibility and the Doctor is the one who seems dubious.

Like many six-parters it's stretched a bit thin in the middle but overall it's great fun.

The Doctor gets a reprieve from his exile on Earth, only to do the bidding of the Time Lords. Landing on a planet with Jo Grant, the Doctor gets involved with some colonist close to starvation . Meanwhile, IMC, the ruthless mining corporation from Earth, is trying to remove the colonist from the planet. A very early politically correct/socially aware Who serial. It's also very padded and dull, but still fun. There are some silly-looking natives throwing spears and stones and a mud-fight. Captain Dents's hair-style is way cool...NOT! Not really much to say about this one, but it is far more interesting until the obligatory appearance of the Master arrives. Still, it's got it's moments. You just have to wait a while for things to happen...

I'm a long time fan of the Time Lord, and I've
always had a special place for Jon Pertwee, the third doctor, who
was one of the best. He had the most conviction as a Doctor as far as I'm concerned. Yes, this is a longish episode
and not exactly jam-packed with 'excitement', but well worth
seeing/ owning if only for the sheer joy of watching
Pertwee and his new companion Jo Grant, with whom he
had (I felt) a great raport on screen. This episode also
features the Master, played to a 'tee' by Roger DelGado, who
also embraced his roles. Mr. DelGadoo has passed away, but he was a real MASTER at the craft of acting, and always created some sparks when facing off with Pertwee. These are, in many ways, unsung heroes of entertainmet. I'm glad they met in space/time so that we could glimpse what they were capable of pulling off.

The Colony is Space is definitely a classic John Pertwee Dr. Who. If you are a big fan
of John Pertwee, this is a must for your collection. I thought the video was okay. If you
are a huge Dr. Who fan I would recommend buying this. If you are not a Dr. Who fan and
are just getting started out, I would not recommend this video. The plot in general was fairly
solid, but too many things going on to concentrate on the plot. The Master arrives, but is a very
weak bad guy character that could have been left out. The video did not drag on like some of the
longer episode ones. The sound quality was fair and archive quality, so I had to adjust the
volume several times while watching. I believe this was a lost episode that was restored from
some old video tapes from PBS. I had never seen this video before until now, and it filled in
the gap for me. The story was classic Dr. Who will all the model ships, fake looking masked
aliens, and fair to poor quality sets. This IS Dr. Who with all the can fix anything,
karate fighting, expert at everything John Pertwee style. If you are getting started I would
recommend other Dr. WHO videos from John Pertwee like: Spearhead from Space,
Planet of the Spiders, Death to the Daleks, and my favorite Frontier in Space.

This story is typical of most 6-parters in Dr. Who, strong through the first 3 episodes but then dragged out as if it were really intended to be a four part story but they had to stretch it out.
As I have been collecting Dr. Who videos since the Mid. 90's, and I'm hoping the BBC will release the rest here by 2004, buying or not buying this video was not the question.
The biggest thing that stood out was the photocopied wall in the Doctor's TARDIS, which looked cheap.
Unless you're a collector like myself, I wouldn't recommened this one.

The Master is at it again. This time, he has stolen the file of the Doomsday Weapon from the Time Lords. In order to deal with it, a small group of Time Lords, presumably the Celestial Intervention Agency later mentioned in the Deadly Assassin story, use the Doctor to deal with it. The Doctor and Jo, who happen to be in the TARDIS testing out a new dematerialization circuit, get whisked off to Uxarius, on 3 March 2472.

They meet a group of colonists, headed by Robert Ashe, who are having such horrible luck, that "unless things improve drastically, [their] colony is in grave danger of starving to death." Since their arrival a year ago, they planted subsistence crops in order to reclaim worn out soil, but the crops shoot up, wither, and then die. They also live in an uneasy truce with the local race of Primitives, whom they give food, not helping their dwindling food supply. Not only that, but two colonists are killed by giant lizards. The Doctor and Jo promptly give their help as usual.

As if they didn't have enough troubles, a detachment from Interplanetary Mining Corporation, headed by the cold-hearted Captain Dent, arrive and claim mineral rights, in conflict with Ashe's claim that Uxarius was classified for colonization. An Adjudicator is sent for, however, they normally favour IMC in disputes. The hot-headed Winton, Ashe's deputy, favours an attack on IMC to drive them out, in contrast to the more diplomatically-minded Ashe. On the side of the IMC, there's the mineralogist Caldwell, who begins to question some of IMC's methods of getting their bottom line. The Adjudicator does come, and guess who it is?

Things heat up between the colonists and IMC, whose role in the colonists suffering may be connected. Then there's Norton, a survivor from another colony attacked by giant lizards and Primitives, whose behaviour in Episode Two becomes definitely suspect.

Colony paints a grim picture of Earth back home, "no room to move, polluted air, not a blade of grass, a government that locks you up if you think for yourself", a place where people don't live like human beings but like battery hens in floating 300 story islands. An unflattering picture is painted of corporations. Dent says in true fascist, corporate style, "What's good for IMC is good for Earth." As for the colonists, he doesn't care the least about their hardships. All he cares is about the profits they'll make in gutting Uxarius of duralinium. It's also an interesting look at the leadership styles and decision-making, Ashe, Winton, and Dent in particular, and why they either succeed or fail.

Other things: Mary Ashe says that "there's no animal life, just a few birds and insects." So, uh..., what exactly does that make birds and insects? Apart from that, Helen Worth stands out as Mary, as does Nicholas Pennell (Winton), Bernard Kay (Caldwell), and John Ringham (Robert Ashe), who also appeared as the ruthless Tlotoxl in Who story The Aztecs and the no-longer available The Smugglers as Blake. Another in-joke was a reference to how the Spanish ambassador was mistaken for the Master, as Roger Delgado (the Master) was himself half-Spanish, half-French.

Some padding is apparent throughout this six-parter, but it's a thoughtful story on the reaction against post-industrial urbanization (the colonists) and the ruthlessness of corporations (IMC).

Doctor Who Colony In Space written by Malcolm Hulke was first broadcast between April 10-May 15, 1971 and was the next to last story of the show's eighth season. The Time Lords realize that the plans for The Doomsday Weapon are missing and they suspect The Master so that secretly send The Doctor and Jo, without their consent, to the planet of Uxarieus in the year 2472 where they discover colonists from earth, natives of the planet, a mining corporation, giant insects and, as you can guess, The Master. This story isn't well regarded in fandom, which is a shame as I think that it's actually pretty good. Part of this might have to do with the fact that the print that was around for so long wasn't in very good quality. The Doctor Who Restoration Team have done a great job of restoring this as it looks much better than it has in a long time. As always, a nice set of extras round out the release.