Doctor Who fans, set your DVR!
To celebrate 50 years of the greatest genre show ever made, BBC America is dipping into the archive and going back to the original Doctor’s run.
On Sunday, January 27, the cable outlet will air the four-part serial “The Aztecs” starting at 9 p.m. EST.
This historical era is one of the best stories from the William Hartnell era. If you’re a new series fan who hasn’t dipped your toe into classic Who, this is a great place to jump in. Even if you’ve seen it before (it’s available on DVD and is set for a re-issue later this year), jump on board, watch the serial and encourage BBC America to give us more classic Who on our airwaves.
To celebrate, our news director will host a review/discussion of this classic serial after it airs on BBC America.
That’s where they start on Netflix. I wonder if they’re just going to run the ones available on the Netflix queue. That would be disappointing, especially if they hit the Key to Time stories, where Netflix is missing arcs 3 and 6, and the Netflix archive totally excludes the run of Colin Baker, with the exception of the 30 seconds after Peter Davison regenerates. I hope it’s better than that.
Most of the stories on Netflix are from the first wave of DVD releases. They were, for the most part, considered to be classics from their respective eras, so we could see them repeated to bring in new fans.
That said, I doubt BBC America would run the whole Key to Time season. I believe we’d see Ark in Space or Pyramids of Mars since they include Sarah Jane Smith, who has a tie to the new series.
As for Colin Baker, the best example of his era would be Vengeance on Varos….
“The Aztecs” episodes are without a doubt Hartnell’s finest in his tenure as the Doctor.
Granted “The Aztecs” was an amazing story, but i think if they should have considered using the first appearance of the Doctor’s great enemy, The Daleks”
All the existing Hartnell era Dalek stories are a bit long — six to seven parts each. And while the original Daleks is iconic for giving us our first appearance of the Daleks and putting the series on the map, parts five and six REALLY drag. I think this is a good choice.
Yes, the Dalek stories are a bit long, and the pacing almost feels as if it were being told in real time, but there is also a certain tension (and perhaps even terror?) with how the Daleks are portrayed here. Even after having watched some abysmally bad Dalek episodes during the McCoy years, going back to watch them in Hartnell brought back the fear that those menacing villains were able to instill in the viewers back when it first aired and I could suddenly understand how it is that they became such an overnight sensation.