nwhyte's review against another edition
4.0
http://nwhyte.livejournal.com/2223888.html[return][return]This is of course my favourite era of Old Who, the run from Robot to Talons of Weng-Chiang, and so I read the book with more than the usual degree of interest (also looking to see if my brother is quoted again - he is, in the essay on Brain of Morbius but talking about Terror of the Zygons). [return][return]As usual I found myself nodding in satisfied agreement 90% of the time and blinking in surprise 10% of the time. Sandifer's deconstruction of The Android Invasion, for example, is brutal; his defence of Planet of Evil a little surprising. Almost fifty pages out of 320 total are devoted to a single story - but The Deadly Assassin was my favourite Old Who story anyweay, and Sandfer convinces that there is far more going on within those 100 minutes than I had realised (and also makes it seem pretty obvious in retrospect). I also very much liked the "Time Can Be Rewritten" entries on spinoff books (Managra, System Shock, Asylum, Corpse Marker and Eye of Heaven), all of which I had read and most of which I enjoyed. And the penultimate piece on The Valley of Death, a Big Finish "lost adventure" by Hinchcliffe, points out some general problems with the era as a whole. Basically this series - in the definitive ebook / print version - joins About Time as key material for the inquiring Whovian.
bookcrazylady45's review against another edition
3.0
Book 4 in a set of compilations of a Dr. Who blog which deconstructs, reviews and critiques all the Dr. Who episode from 1963. This book covers 1975-1978 my doctor Tom Baker. I have no plans to read the first three but I did buy volume 5. Dense and detailed giving more significance to the television show than perhaps it deserves but a fascinating take nonetheless.
kitpower's review against another edition
5.0
Worth the price of entry for the Mary Whitehouse article alone. Marvelous stuff.
lordofthemoon's review against another edition
3.0
This collection of academic essays about Doctor Who is not a book that I would have bought or read of my own accord, but it was a Christmas present last year, and now that I have read it, it was quite interesting.
Adapted from the blog of the same name, this is the fourth volume of the series, covering the first half of Tom Baker's reign as the Doctor, under producer Philip Hinchcliffe, regarded by many as the show's Golden Age. I haven't read any of the other books, but I don't feel that I really missed out on anything.
The book has an essay for each of the Baker stories that it covers, although it tends to use them as a jumping off point for discussing 'around' the series, Britain and popular culture of the era in general, a technique that the author refers to as 'psychochronography' and which is described in more detail on the blog prelude linked above. As well as these, there are other essays, generically headed under titles such as 'Time Can Be Rewritten' (essays using some of the novels as jumping off points, rather than the TV show); 'Pop Between Realities, Home In Time for Tea' (about other TV shows of the era and how they affected British culture); 'You Were Expecting Someone Else?' (dealing with spin-off material); and some other generic essays, some written specially for the book, rather than being adapted from the blog.
I'm not an academic and I often have trouble reading academic texts, so I was unsure about this. To be honest, reading this hasn't changed that. Some of what he wrote does seem awfully pompous (especially the [awfully long] essay on The Deadly Assassin) and some left me scratching my head. But there's also some solid critique of Doctor Who in there, and something that made me think again about stories I really like (particularly The Talons of Weng Chiang).
So, interesting enough, but I don't think I'll search other the other volumes of the series. I might go and read the blog though.
Adapted from the blog of the same name, this is the fourth volume of the series, covering the first half of Tom Baker's reign as the Doctor, under producer Philip Hinchcliffe, regarded by many as the show's Golden Age. I haven't read any of the other books, but I don't feel that I really missed out on anything.
The book has an essay for each of the Baker stories that it covers, although it tends to use them as a jumping off point for discussing 'around' the series, Britain and popular culture of the era in general, a technique that the author refers to as 'psychochronography' and which is described in more detail on the blog prelude linked above. As well as these, there are other essays, generically headed under titles such as 'Time Can Be Rewritten' (essays using some of the novels as jumping off points, rather than the TV show); 'Pop Between Realities, Home In Time for Tea' (about other TV shows of the era and how they affected British culture); 'You Were Expecting Someone Else?' (dealing with spin-off material); and some other generic essays, some written specially for the book, rather than being adapted from the blog.
I'm not an academic and I often have trouble reading academic texts, so I was unsure about this. To be honest, reading this hasn't changed that. Some of what he wrote does seem awfully pompous (especially the [awfully long] essay on The Deadly Assassin) and some left me scratching my head. But there's also some solid critique of Doctor Who in there, and something that made me think again about stories I really like (particularly The Talons of Weng Chiang).
So, interesting enough, but I don't think I'll search other the other volumes of the series. I might go and read the blog though.
daveversace's review against another edition
5.0
I've already raved about this series. If you have any interest in Doctor Who as a cultural artefact or as a reflection of British society, just read it. This volume is worth it for the epic four-part essay on 'The Deadly Assassin' alone.
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