From: ph9991_manfr@rivers.acc.uwrf.edu
Newsgroups: rec.arts.drwho
Subject: Re: YALEM - "The Time Warrior"
Date: 30 Dec 92 10:38:20 -0600
Organization: University of Wisconsin - River Falls

>>through.  
> 
> I think you be requiring that Lionheart employ experts for each show to be able
> to say something has been edited. 

HANG ON A MINUTE EVERYONE!  

This is the second person now who has missed the point of my original posting.
I was talking about an edit made to "The Time Warrior" IN THE BROADCAST 
VERSION OF THE STORY, not the Home Video.  The Home Video is pristine and
perfect and it's where I found the scene missing from the broadcast version.


New releases clearly say that the videos are
> original unedited recordings. I think it's common knowledge that all of the
> old releases (i.e. movie format) videos are edited.

Not all.  The only edits made to many of them are the traditional cliffhanger
ones that you get in a broadcast movie format, except that on these videos
those edits are made cleaner and more complete than their broadcast 
counterparts.

To date, I have seen all but "Day" and "Death" to/of the Daleks, "Robots
of Death" and "Revenge of the Cybermen" on CBS/Fox.
Videos which have been edited more than they should are "Pyramids of Mars,"
"The Five Doctors," and "The Brain of Morbius."

"Spearhead from Space," and "The Talons of Weng-Chiang" each contain one
tiny, tiny edit each (Spearhead has a piece of music excised because it was
a Fleetwood Mac tune and they couldn't get the clearance, but the footage
is still there just minus the music, and Talons has some of a fight scene
slightly cut so that it could fit the UK ratings system for violence.).

"The Seeds of Death,"
"The Time Warrior," "The Ark in Space," "Terror of the Zygons," and
"The Deadly Assassin" are all completely complete with no edits at all from
what I've seen in the broadcast versions, and in fact "Warrior" is an
improvement because of the edit actually in the broadcast version.
"Seeds" actually is the broadcast version, though. 


 My way of fighting this is
> to buy the new releases and not the old releases. I have everything on tape
> already and I'm not going to buy a video just for the sake of a higher quality
> movie format tape.

But recall that in the stories I mentioned, the only edits are of the
cliffhanger credits and in fact the melding of the episodes is done much
better than the broadcast versions are.  Additionally, the broadcast versions
of the early Tom Baker stories are still those old Time/Life prints and
thus the color is faded much more than it should be.  I first noticed this
when I saw "Pyramids" and could see the jagged edges on the CSO effects
on the sarcophagus for the first time.  Couldn't see them in the broadcast
versions, or the wires holding up the TARDIS key either, which are plainly
visible on the Video print.

 The fact that the new releases are episodic is what makes
> me buy them. I urge others to do the same. Maybe the difference in sales
> numbers might make them re-release the old ones (probably not - what do you do
> recall the old ones?).

Given the state of Who in the States, I urge eveyone to buy all of the 
videos, old and new alike, otherwise we may lose the line all together.


> 
> On the topic of produced videos, I finally got around to getting Tomb. I told
> one other person about this problem and his video had it too. In episode 4,
> near the beginning, Toberman sits up on a table. The next scene is in front of
> the tombs. When the camera zooms in on the tombs (I think the Cybermen are
> sealing themselves in), there are several glitches in the scan lines. It is
> very easy to see if the problem is there. It lasts about 5 seconds (during the
> whole tomb zoom 8-). Can anyone verify it? or should I be returning mine? If
> it's there and it's not on the master tape, this makes two CBS/Fox releases
> with problems, the other being The War Games (which I know is not on the master
> tape). CBS/Fox never replied to my letter about the problem.
> 

"Tomb" does indeed have that problem, but for heaven's sake man, it's only
five seconds.  And by the way it looks to me, I think it's in the original
master tape/film that was returned from Hong Kong because it looks like a 
film problem, not a video one.  
"War Games" has a few audio problems on the latter episodes, but I still take
this version any day over the broadcast versions because episodes 7-9 on
the broadcast versions are very murky and were not cleaned up AT ALL,
unlike this video.  I was well amazed that those prints could look as good
as they do now.


> I want to do my little bit to keep Doctor Who alive by buying the videos and
> maybe a few novels, but I don't want to get screwed by the people who don't
> really give a shit about the show, rather just the money.
> 
> Tom

It's because they only care about the money that any little boycotts that
someone might try to start could get the entire line tossed out on its ear.

Steven.K.Manfred