Product Details

• Actors: Jon Pertwee, Katy Manning
• Directors: Lennie Mayne
• Writers: Brian Hayles
• Producers: Barry Letts
• Format: Color, Subtitled, NTSC
• Language: English (Dolby Digital 1.0)
• Subtitles: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Studio: BBC Home Entertainment
• DVD Release Date: May 4, 2010
• Run Time: 100 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B0035JHYMA
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #30,850 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

Taking a test flight in the TARDIS, the Doctor and Jo make an inelegant landing on the planet Peladon. When they are mistaken for representatives from Earth, the Doctor soon finds himself chairing the committee of alien delegates assessing Peladon's petition to join the Galactic Federation. When one of the King's advisors is killed, the High Priest fears the ancient Curse of Aggedor is at work, but the Doctor suspects his old enemies the Ice Warriors are to blame. Can the Doctor and Jo uncover the identity of the saboteurs before a major diplomatic incident plunges them into war?

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars "I wanted to save our world...." May 23, 2000

By Brian May

Format:VHS Tape

This Jon Pertwee story is very enjoyable. It is well designed and directed, has terrific costumes and a real medieval atmosphere. It's also very well written. Allegedly (or as most analyses of the story purport) "The Curse of Peladon" is a commentary on the UK's proposed entry into the Common Market. The writer's politics must clearly have been in favour of joining with Europe for him to liken England to a backward planet deciding to embrace the "progress" of joining the galactic Federation, which is portrayed as a Star Trek type conglomeration of planets. However, this is a story that can be enjoyed independent of such a context. What you have is partly a tale of court intrigue combined with a political thriller, which becomes more complex as the story progresses. The involvement of the Doctor and companion Jo Grant opens a can of worms - he is forced to impersonate a delegate overseeing whether Peladon is fit to join the Federation, while Jo must masquerade as a Princess. Small factors such as these escalate the situation; by the start of the final episode, political machinations have never been more gripping. The diplomatic nuances are a credit to Brian Hayles's skill as a writer. The return of his monsters, the Ice Warriors, is also good to see. Alan Bennion and Sonny Caldinez perform their second of three double acts as Ice Lord and Warrior; the decision to portray them as allies rather than as conquering alien "baddies" as they have been before is also a clever move. The Doctor is forced to question his prejudices about them. Bennion's performance as the Ice Lord is wonderful - he makes the character likable, honourable (especially when he announces the debt he owes to the Doctor) and quite suave. The alien designs of Alpha Centauri and Arcturus are interesting, even if a little simplistic by today's standard of what aliens should be. The two main Peladonian characters are also well presented. King Peladon, played by David Troughton (son of Patrick), could be criticised because of his effeminacy and indecision (a "wet fish" as Jo calls him), but he is a young ruler, lonely at the top and has to make some difficult decisions. His romantic inclinations towards Jo, while hardly touching, don't fall into the mushy zone. Hepesh is perhaps the most intriguing character. He is the story's antagonist, but his opposition to joining the Federation is not presented as evil. He DOES represent the conservative view, opposed to progress, but he is simply a man of his convictions. (I'm not sure whether the opponents of change in the story's wider context are meant to be as sympathetically presented as Hepesh - I don't think so.) "The Curse of Peladon" can be enjoyed both in and out of context. It is a gripping drama, visually pleasing and very classy production.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A classic. August 19, 2000

By G.Spider

Format:VHS Tape

With its grown-up storyline, believable characters and interesting, well-thought-out alien society, this is Dr Who as it should be. The sets are great and the plot, which involves a primative society's fear or technology, is filled with 'whodunnit' suspense. The Ice Warriors are at their best. Ice Lord Izlyr especially comes across as one of the strongest and most interesting alien characters the programme has seen. A true classic.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars A much-beloved story from the Jon Pertwee years that hasn't held up with time April 23, 2011

By buckbooks

Format:DVD|Amazon Verified Purchase

The Peladon stories (first "The Curse of Peladon," followed by "The Monster of Peladon" two seasons later) are fondly remembered by many Who fans for their menagerie of imaginative alien creatures and lively, action-driven plotting, but it's an enthusiasm I have difficulty sharing. I've always found the stories' setting dark and claustrophobic, and the action feels cramped. The Peladon stories could almost have been performed on radio without losing much in the translation.

"Curse" is notable for reintroducing the Ice Warriors as a reformed, peace-loving race that now eschews war for a leading role in a growing Galactic Federation (they return to characteristic, evil form in "Monster"), but the other aliens in these stories are hard to take. First, the hermaphroditic hexapod from Alpha Centauri (who appears in both "Curse" and "Monster") is screechy and annoying, a one-eyed green monstrosity that must wear living-room curtains around its neck to cover up the unnatural juncture of its head with its stalklike body. The design of Arcturus in "Curse" is equally preposterous, a primitive puppet head inside a transparent dome attached to a machine body--he's basically a Dalek with the organic bits visible on the outside. The "monster" of Peladon, fear of which drives so much of the action in both stories, is essentially a man in an ape suit with the head of Alf whom the Doctor easily tames with hypnosis and Venusian lullabies.

Both stories revolve around the struggles of Peladon's weak monarchs to maintain rule in the face of, first, a double-dealing High Priest in "Curse" and then sex discrimination and a miners' rebellion in "Monster." In "Curse," you either warm to the supposed chemistry between King Peladon (played by David Troughton, son of Patrick) and Jo Grant (Katy Manning) or you don't (I didn't). I found Peladon's daughter and heir, Queen Thalira (Nina Thomas), in "Monster" an empty cipher, and Sarah Jane's feminist exhortations for her to step up to power sound hopelessly dated now.

The Special Features accompanying "The Curse of Peladon" include the first part of an extensive if somewhat overblown "making of" documentary on both Peladon stories (beware of spoilers that give away elements of "The Monster of Peladon"); a quite thorough and enjoyable retrospective on the Ice Warriors; and a look back at the memorable collaboration of Jon Pertwee and Katy Manning as the Third Doctor and companion Jo Grant.