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Actors: David Tennant, Michelle Ryan, John Simms
Format: AC-3, Box set, Color, Dolby, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
Number of discs: 5
MPAA Rating: NR
Studio: BBC Warner
DVD Release Date: February 2, 2010
Slice of SciFi Rating: 4 out of 5
Fans still coming to grips with the departure of David Tennant as the 10th Doctor may find some consolation in the latest box set from BBC America featuring all five of the just-completed run of “Doctor Who” specials. With four of the five filmed and shown in HD, fans who have a Blu-Ray player can enjoy the stunning visuals in all their HD glory, including a newly upgraded version of “The Next Doctor” for the Blu-Ray release.
The specials, shown over the course of a year on the BBC and then BBC America, were a kind of a victory lap tour for Tennant and outgoing producer Russell T. Davies. All of the specials had input from Davies in terms of writing with varying degrees of success. The best special on the set is the creepy and delightful story “The Waters of Mars,” a story that echoes the Troughton-era base-under-siege mentality all while giving fans some fascinating character development for the Tennant Doctor. The weakest is the first half of the end of the Tennant era, “The End of Time, Part One.” the story suffers from a lack of pacing and the usual Davies penchant for drawing out the cliffhanger long past the point that is suspenseful and instead feels like we’re padding out the episode as we wait for the stinger to finally sound.
As with most “Doctor Who” releases, this box set is packed full of extras, including all new commentaries on each episode. If you just picked up the vanilla releases of each story as they were released separately, you may want to consider an upgrade. The commentaries range in quality but they do have several with actor David Tennant reflecting on his time in the role and his final appearances as the Doctor. The commentaries do suffer a bit from being a bit too self-congratulatory at times and it would be interesting to hear the cast and crew reflect on the stories in a couple of years after they’ve had a bit of time to settle.
Each story comes with its own “Confidential” look at the making of the story and behind-the-scenes details. The set features a new “Confidential” produced for the set on “The Next Doctor.”
If you’re a tenth Doctor fan and a “Doctor Who” completist, this set is a perfect buy. You can pick it up for about the same price as the two single releases of “Mars” and “End of Time” hitting stores today and get a wealth of extras and a smaller box on the shelf.
Do the Blu-ray versions have more commentaries than the regular DVDs? Mine only seem to have them for The End of Time. Of course, I have the podcast commentaries that were released shortly after broadcast as mp3s, but they tend to do more formal ones for the DVD releases.
I understand that they’re offering more betterer extras on Blu-ray releases as an incentive, but it’s rather frustrating for those of us who can’t afford the extra expense.