Chuck's Who: September 2010

Having recently picked up a few BBC Doctor Who audio adventures I've been on a little campaign to listen to them all again, or in some cases for the first time for the ones still in cellophane!

For those who don't know what I'm talking about(!), briefly there are some 27 stories from the black and white era of Doctor Who which aren't complete, of which 10 no longer exist at all on film! Over the course of the years the BBC - which do still have the story soundtracks - have been releasing the stories on audio, with narration provided by stars of the show to place scenes in context, etc. The really early releases on cassette had narration from people like Jon Pertwee, Tom Baker and Colin Baker, but with the advent of CD soon settled down to actors involved in the stories themselves - mainly Peter Purves and Frazer Hines, but sometimes others like William Russell, Anneke Wills and Wendy Padbury.

I did listen to a few of these back when I first bought them, but I must admit I preferred the visual versions from reconstructions (see Loose Cannon for details on those). However, having finally invested in CD technology in the car it was time to dust these off again!

Since the missing/incomplete stories had all been released by 2006, the BBC then started releasing stories that do exist as narrated versions too. Originally I thought this was a waste of time, but now view these as an "audio described" version of the story, which again is great for the car or putting on in the background when I'm typing on the laptop like now [currently The Macra Terror with Colin Baker narrating in the style of Brian Cant it seems!].

One thing about listening to stories in this way as that in many cases the stories are greatly improved in this medium. A really good example of this is The Space Pirates which is generally acknowledged as being boring as expletive - and the existing episode two backs that up admirably! - but actually runs along nicely as a decent story on audio. It may be down to Frazer Hines's delivery of the narration, but it almost makes me want to see the story itself. Almost. Similarly, The Dominators is another plodding story but the audio transforms it into something more pacy (quite ironic with the DVD having just come out).

Of course the great thing about these CDs are that you can still enjoy listening to adventures that you'll never be able to see (unless we're very very lucky some day).

Plus recent ones comes with special features too! Well, an interview with the narrator placing the story in context (or indeed a whole disc-worth on the audio-only story The Pescatons!).