Review of Doctor Who: The Green Death

Introduction

The Green Death is the third Doctor Who story to be released in 2004, and coincidentally enough it features the third Doctor, in the shape of Jon Pertwee. The Green Death is the final story from season 10 of the show. It`s the last story to feature assistant Jo Grant (Katy Manning), who has been with the Doctor since the season 8 opener "Terror of the Autons". She was replaced by Sarah-Jane Smith, who stays with the Doctor through his regeneration, and all the way to season 14`s "The Hand of Fear".

It is remembered fondly by many people (even non-fans) as "the Welsh one with the big maggots". The story is outlined up above.

Video

This story is now over 30 years old, so you might be forgiven for thinking that it will look like a 30 year old programme. And that`s almost entirely true. There are one or two good sets, but also some very unconvincing ones. There`s quite a lot of location work, which looks authentic enough, but unfortunately not all of the location work got shot, so you also get some studio work superimposed on the location shots, and this looks utterly fake.

And then we get to the maggots. Oh dear. They`re not scary, they`re not convincing, and the scene where the Doctor & Jo pilot an old mining cart through the middle of the maggot colony is utterly laughable. There`s much hilarity on the commentary track at this point. And don`t mention the giant fly, it`s awful.

However, the video quality itself is stunning given the age of the story. This is another story that has been cleaned up by the Dr Who Restoration Team, and a fantastic job has been done as ever. It probably looks better now than it did when first broadcast.

Audio

A DD2.0 track is presented here, though it is just a mono track played through both channels. As with the picture, it`s good considering its age, and it has been cleaned up and tidied up. The soundtrack is a bit less stereotyped than some of the earlier Pertwee stories too.

Watch out for lots of Welsh accents and stereotypes, although the commentators (including Katy Manning who is half Welsh) have a bit of a debate about just how stereotyped some of them are.

Features

Keeping up the great tradition set by previous discs, a nice bundle of extras are piled onto the disc. Not quite as many as some stories, but there are 6 episodes on this disc, which means that there`s not so much room for extras.

First up we get a commentary track from actress Katy Manning, producer (and co-writer) Barry Letts and script editor Terrance Dicks. This gives us three different views of the story. They all have plenty to say, and recall memories of locations and other cast members. Katy Manning is the entertainer, lapsing into impressions and amusing anecdotes, but also falling into an annoying childish voice all too often. She also lapses into Australian now and again, a product of having lived there for so long. A very interesting commentary despite the childish voice.

As with previous releases, there`s another commentary track which is the subtitle commentary option, which brings up production notes throughout each episode. Plenty of useful information is contained here, and lots of good bits of trivia.

Next up is "Global Conspiracy?" - a twelve minute spoof documentary about the mysterious events that occurred in Llanfairfach in 1973. Written and presented by long time fan and League of Gentleman star Mark Gattiss, it`s very funny and well worth watching.

There are also three separate interviews with actor Stewart Bevan, writer Robert Sloman and visual effects assistant, Colin Mapson. These all offer different perspectives and memories of the show.

The Picture Gallery gives 4 minutes of photographs, and there is also an easy to find easter egg which gives you access to original continuity trails for the show, from 2 different decades.

Conclusion

Another excellent Dr Who DVD from the BBC. As usual, picture and sound are as good as they possibly could be, and there are quality extras in the form of the audio commentary, and the production notes subtitles. The spoof documentary is also good fun.

This time round the story doesn`t always hold up, and the very unconvincing maggots (and the subsequent fly) are a bit of a distraction which do spoil matters. The story is rather typical of Jon Pertwee`s earthbound Doctor, but there are some interesting themes and threads buried in there (a fungus as a replacement for meat, anti-globalisation protests). However, it comes down to some unconvincing villains and some unconvincing monsters - in this case some terrible giant maggots (and a rubbish giant fly). There are some touching moments when Jo Grant leaves at the end of the story (and it caused Katy Manning to cry during the commentary), but at the end of the day it`s rather an average story.

This DVD is a chance to see a favourite programme looking and sounding better than ever, with some great bonus features and an enjoyable commentary track that will certainly appeal to fans of the show. Definitely recommended for fans of this story, more casual fans might want to check out other releases for better stories.