Wednesday, January 22, 2014

Compare and Contrast

Following my last post, I was surprised at the negative reaction to Ian Levine's animation. God, hadn't I apologized in advance for it? Didn't the constant references to Cosgrove Hall make it abundantly clear that no high expectations were required? In fairness to Blubberguts (a sentence rarely used by higher anthropoids) it was certainly no worse than the original Shada animation, Scream of the Shalka, The Infinite Quest or The Invasion with it's static head and shoulders lip-synching chic.

However, the truth is we expect a better standard of animation and - the endearing dodginess of The Ice Warriors aside - what we expect is what we've got for The Reign of Terror, The Tenth Planet and The Moonbase. With The Underwater Menace and The Web of Fear due to have the same fate, here's a reminder of what we were getting.

As a little subtextual gag, the musical accompanyment is Enya's Carribbean Blue (however you spell it) which is also the name of that audio drama thing I was doing. Remember that? Back when David Tennant was the Doctor? Ah, forget it. But when you do watch The Moonbase, I think you'll find the only way to understand what is happening is to believe that Hobson has been partially-brainwashed by a Cyberman and is deliberately ruining absolutely everything he is responsible for. Seriously. How a trained astronaut thinks a hull breach can be defeated with polyester and cotton... bloody hell, it goes beyond Garth Marenghi at times...


No comments: