TV Movie extras

[dbskyler]

Still making my way through the extras on the Doctor Who TV movie DVD, and what did I stumble across? Nicholas Courtney! Nicholas Courtney, who had nothing whatsoever to do with this movie, was the host for one of the extras. Oh, look at him. There he is. It's sad, but also kind of nice to get the surprise appearance.

I like the Paul McGann/Sylvester McCoy/Nick Briggs commentary, although I've only heard the first half so far. I particularly loved one story Paul McGann told. His agent at the time of the movie was Janet Fielding, and she came to Vancouver to be present during the shooting. Some local Doctor Who fan came over to McGann, started talking to him, looked at Janet, paused, and then suddenly realized who she was. The fan then went into a long list of every single episode Janet had ever appeared in, and everything she had ever done. And Paul McGann, new to Doctor Who fandom, could only wonder, "What have I gotten myself into?"

But so far, the best extra is definitely Paul McGann's audition. Not for the audition itself, but for the amazing crackiness of the script. I'm glad clocketpatch warned me about it, because if I had come across that cold, I have no idea what my reaction would've been.

For those of you who haven't encountered this yet, let me try to summarize the apparent plot for you:

The Doctor visits the Master's grandfather, and thanks him for taking care of him. The Doctor reveals that he has found the Scrolls of Rassilon. Not the Black Scrolls that were burned in "The Five Doctors" I presume, but some other scrolls. Because as we all know, Rassilon had a thing about scrolls. Anyway, these scrolls were prophesied to be found by an important Time Lord who is a descendant of Rasillon, but the Doctor discounts that because he's not descended from Rassilon, unlike the Master's grandfather, or the Master's son, or the Master. Except -- surprise! Grandad tells him that his son -- Ulysses -- went to Earth, got an Earth woman pregnant, and sent the resulting son back to Gallifrey. This son was -- you guessed it! -- the Doctor. This apparently means the Doctor deserves some sash of some sort (I bet it was the Sash of Rassilon), but all the Doctor can focus on at that moment is how he and the Master are brothers.

That's the first audition scene. Then in scene 2, there are Nazis. I kid you not. Nazis. And V2 rockets. Because what goes better with Gallifrey, sashes and scrolls than Nazis?

Then in scene 3, the Doctor's talking to a woman who knows the Doctor's father, and saw him regenerate from an old man into "a weathered Kansas farmer." I mean, what? So okay, maybe you can say weathered, but what would make you call a regenerated Time Lord a farmer right off the bat? And why would you say he's from KANSAS?

I'm still trying to figure out how this was all supposed to go together into a coherent story. I also want to know what the sash has to do with anything. Or the scrolls. Or Kansas. I'm sort of tempted to send the whole thing over to dw_straybunnies just to see if someone can write this into a fic.

Finally, speaking of American Time Lords:

Does it bother anyone else that the Master speaks with an American accent in the TV movie? It throws me every single time I watch. It just seems wrong!

Comments

[thisbluespirit]

Heh, 2Entertain are using a randomiser for these things. I don't know why they think it's a good idea to reissue 3 DVDs together, when people are bound to have bought at least one of them... And Talons is a mystery. Caves and the TVM were both early releases that are obvious choices to have a bit more polish and few more extras. Talons came much later and had a whole extra disc with it anyway. The next lot of reissues this month contains Carnival of Monsters, Seeds of Death and Resurrection of the Daleks. I had a whole post about the randomness sometime, I think.

[curuchamion.livejournal.com]

Didn't john_elliott make a Random Box-Set Generator in response to your post? I seem to remember that.