From: ph9991_manfr@rivers.acc.uwrf.edu
Newsgroups: rec.arts.drwho
Subject: Re: video tape edits
Date: 27 Jan 93 16:39:32 -0600
Distribution: rec
Organization: University of Wisconsin - River Falls

> 
>>dave@yoyodyne.demon.co.uk (David Bisping) wrote:
> 
>>-> You're right just checked by tape, it gives a 100 mins running time
>>-> with a flash on the tape box proclaiming 'complete unedited
>>-> episodes'.
> 
>> Does this latest release include the sound effects that were previously
>>missing from the broadcasted version?
> 
>  I was under the impression tht exported prints of "Morbius" were minus
>  sound effects for Part2 due to some conversion problem, similar to that of
>  Ressurection of the Daleks. That means that the UK version was complete in the
>  first place. To answer the question the video does have these sound effects
>  and it makes Morbius one of the best releases.
> 
>   Jason .     
> 

The UK has, to the best of my knowledge, never shown a complete episode
minus the sound FX and Incidental Music.  I understand a small clip of
"Resurrection of the Daleks" used in "Resistance is Useless" was from the
soundless version that the US got, but other than that, no they haven't
seen it.  

There have been two sound FX and Incidental Music mistakes to affect the
US markets, only one of which has been corrected.

The first and the one still not corrected occurred with the first mass
conversion of episodes by Time-Life back in the late 70s for syndication
to commercial and later PBS stations when the commercial stations didn't
like it.  This was on "The Brain of Morbius" Part One.  Nowhere in this
episode will you hear any music, and any sound FX you do hear were created
in-studio during production.  This is why the TARDIS appears to materialize
silently, for example.  The fault of this rests on two quarters, the
primary one being the BBC for supplying the wrong copy of the episode
to Time-Life and the secondary for not noticing and complaining.
When Lionheart took over the syndication in the early 80s, they merely used
the same prints that Time-Life had been supplied with.  So their fault
in this case is sort of "third-hand."  These same prints were the ones
they used to compile their "movie" formats that most PBS stations in the
US eventually ran, thus the first 25 minutes of "Brain" in movie format
is also minus the sound FX and music.  
The last time I saw this story was two years ago in episode form, and it
was still not fixed.
The edited-down version available on CBS/Fox video, whilst missing 30
minutes of material, is not from the same print as the Lionheart or
Time-Life syndication packages.  It is the finished print still in the
BBC Archives and as such has all the sound FX and incidental music where
it should be.  Additionally, those early Time-Life conversions tended to
lose a LOT of the color from the picture, and this is most noticeable
on Seasons 12-15 ("Robt" to "The Invasion of Time") and on other series
originally marketed by Time-Life such as "Fawlty Towers" and "Monty
Python's Flying Circus."  The CBS/Fox color blows the broadcast color
completely away.

The second sound FX and music mistake has since been corrected, but it
took between two and three years for Lionheart to do it.  
This one occurs on the prints of "Resurrection of the Daleks" supplied
to the US, particularly the "movie" format versions.  
"Resurrection" was the first story in the UK to not consist of 25-minute
episodes.  This story was in 45-50 minute segments, and this "new" way
of doing things may have caused some of the confusion back in the BBC
videotape library.   
Anywho, Part Two of "Resurrection of the Daleks" sent to the States was
minus the music and sound FX, which in this format means the entire second
half of the story.  By the time this aired, virtually all PBS stations
were showing the series in "movie" format and any station that did got
this problem.  
For those few stations still showing the show in episode form, Lionheart
supplied a 4-part 25-minute version which would have been the version
shown in the UK had the Winter Olympics not eaten up some of the time
slots and forced the 45-minute change in the first place.  
Whether this version of the story was complete or not, I do not know
firsthand and I've heard conflicting reports secondhand so I won't say.
I do know from DWM that this 4-part version did include an extra scene
not seen in the American "movie" format or in the UK original broadcast.
This scene comes near the end of Part Two as the Doctor takes Stein
into the TARDIS to head for the Dalek ship, and Stein has lines that follow
the familiar theme of "hey, it's bigger inside than outside!"  
After about three years of marketing this naff version, Lionheart finally
realized their mistake and began sending out a repaired version.  
It's still not ideal though, because apparantly Lionheart was too cheap
to get hold of and convert the full version.   All they did was get hold
of t proper soundtrack and lay that in over the old video version.
The sounds are there, but depressingly the version now being marketed sounds
like you're hearing the action through some sort of tunnel or perhaps
you're listening to a tape recording taken by placing a microphone next
to a TV set.  (It only sounds like that in the second half)
Little does anyone realize how lucky we all are that Dalek voices are
recorded live in-studio, rather than laid in in post-production, or else
ANYTHING a Dalek would have said in the second half of the story wouldn't
have been there!  As it was, we lost Davros' "thinking" to himself as he
gets his escape pod ready.  
Don't get me wrong though, I'll take the somewhat muffled version over
the effect-less version any day!

Steven.K.Manfred