Doctor Who: The E-Space Trilogy - Full Circle/State of Decay/Warriors' Gate (Episodes 112-114)
Starring: Tom Baker, Lalla WardStudio: BBC Warner
MPAA Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Format: Box set, Collector's Edition, Color, DVD-Video, Original recording remastered, NTSC
Audio: Dolby Digital 1.0
Running Time: 288 minutes
DVD Release: May 5th 2009
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DVD Review
The Tardis has brought the Doctor, Romana and K9 to an alternate unvierse, E-Space, where huge poisonous spiders, space vampires and gateways between past and future are commonplace.
DVD Features:
Deleted Scenes
Featurette
Interviews
Production Notes
User Reviews
I have to admit... - Rating: 5/5
...these three episodes are some of my favorites from the Tom Baker era. They were shown here in the US just as my personal enthusiasm for the show was reaching its peak and cemented my loyalty to the show for all time. They're very well written episodes and classics of the classic series.
Episode One, Full Circle, finds the Doctor, Romana and K9 in E-Space, or exo-space, outside of the normal space-time continuum of N-Space, or normal space. It introduces a new companion, Adric, who ultimately stows away aboard the TARDIS and joins the team. It's an episode that is somewhat circular in its presentation of the evolution of a species, and how the truth of origin can be lost over the course of generations. It also shows the Doctor in a sort of surrogate father role to a Marshmen youth, with some excellent one-liners from Tom Baker and poor K9's head used in a myriad of unsightly ways. The Marshmen costumes are ghastly, but the story is nicely done.
Episode Two, State of Decay, brings the element of horror to the show for the first time, introducing a vampire-like being, long thought defeated by the Time Lords, but who escaped into E-Space to avoid total annihilation, whose human servants lord over a sort of medieval, serf-like colony. There's an inkling as well, of a genuine affection between the Doctor and Romana that's really quite sweet. Then there's blood, bats, planet/life-sucking creatures of immense power, and a directive from Rassilon and the ancients of Gallifrey. What more could you ask for?
Episode Three, Warriors' Gate, is the final episode in this trilogy, and is a sort of avant-garde offering, with abstract, visceral imagery that is very dream-like and disturbing at times, as it shifts from past to present in the story of the Tharils, walkers between the universes, and heralds the departure of Romana.
Again, these three episodes are very well written stories with a depth that waned, unfortunately, as the era of John Nathan-Turner progressed, but which show Tom Baker at his best as the fourth incarnation of our favorite Time Lord. They are a must have for any Whovian's DVD library.
Some of the best Who stories - Rating: 5/5
I got the R2 release of this set because I could not wait for the BBC's lethargic USA release schedule. Its ironic, Dr. Who has always been more popular around the world (and especially in the USA) because of the relative non-stop playing of the episodes. Those in the UK most likely never have seen these episodes because they only aired ONCE, and were previously on available on VHS, if you could find them.
Anyhoo, the primary reason why I purchased this set, was for the episode "Warrior's Gate," which has always been my favourite Dr. Who episode of all time. As other reviewers have stated, the extras in this release are some of the best extras I have ever seen in a dvd release. The extras are of a "documentary-level" quality, and are very thorough. What I did like especially was the interviews with the crew and directors of Warrior's Gate. Its amazing that after almost 30 years, the director is able to speak of the episode and its problems, like it was yesterday.
These three stories represent the Apex of Dr.Who, as far as I'm concerned. The episodes captured a point in time of Science-Fiction that is now long gone.
The extras....in case you are wondering....... - Rating: 5/5
These Classic Who stories from the Tom Baker years stand up well on their own,
(I'd give each story 3 1/2 - 4 stars - the main weakness for me being the character of Adric - although I'd take the character of Adric over the character of Peri, of the Peter Davidson and Colin Baker eras, any day),
but what makes this set really shine are the extras. Elsewhere on the web you can find folks enjoying or dissing various aspects of these extras, but I enjoyed them all (having watched the region 2 releases.)
My one main disappointment with this set is the absence of Tom Baker in the Commentaries or interviews.
Since Amazon US has not yet added a full description of the Extras included with this set, here they are (as posted on Amazon's UK site)......
Special Features:
Disc 1 - Full Circle
Commentary - with actor Matthew Waterhouse, writer Andrew Smith and script editor Christopher H. Bidmead.
All Aboard the Starliner - cast and crew look back at the making of this story.
K-9 in E-Space - a look at the robot dog's role in the E-Space arc. With actors Lalla Ward, John Leeson, script editor Christopher H Bidmead, writers Andrew Smith and Terrance Dicks.
Swap Shop - Noel Edmonds chats to Matthew Waterhouse and takes calls from viewers of the Saturday morning entertainment show after Waterhouse's first appearance as Adric.
E-Space - Fact or Fiction? - Could E-Space really exist? A look at the science behind the concept of Exo-Space featuring script editor Christopher H Bidmead, visual effects designer (and Fellow of the British Interplanetary Society) Mat Irvine, authors Stephen Baxter and Paul Parsons, planetary scientist Dr Andrew Ball and astronomer and television presenter Sir Patrick Moore.
Continuity - BBC continuity announcements from the original transmission.
Photo Gallery
Isolated Score
Coming Soon
PDF Material
Programme Subtitles
Subtitle Production Notes
Disc 2 - State of Decay
Commentary with actor Matthew Waterhouse, director Peter Moffatt and writer Terrance Dicks.
The Vampire Lovers - cast and crew look back at the making of this story.
Film Trims - mute 35mm film trims from the model effects filming for the story, featuring alternative takes of the Tower and the scout ship staking the Great Vampire.
Leaves of Blood - a history of Vampires in literary fiction featuring authors Ramsey Campbell, Stephen Gallagher, Kim Newman, Pete Crowther, Simon Clark, Alison L R Davies, Chris Fowler and vampire specialist Dr Tina Rath.
The Blood Show - a fascinating insight into the use and meaning of blood in society and culture.
The Frayling Reading - cultural historian Sir Christopher Frayling looks at State of Decay with reference to the vampire stories of film and literature.
Continuity - BBC continuity announcements from the original transmission.
Photo Gallery
Isolated Score
Coming Soon
PDF Material
Programme Subtitles
Subtitle Production Notes
Disc 3 - Warriors' Gate
Commentary with actors Lalla Ward and John Leeson, director Paul Joyce, script editor Christopher H Bidmead and visual effects designer Mat Irvine.
The Dreaming - cast and crew look back at the troubled making of this story.
The Boy with the Golden Star - actor Matthew Waterhouse looks back on his time on the show.
Lalla's Wardrobe - a trip through Romana's time on the show via the medium of the many costumes actress Lalla Ward wore along the way. It's a one-off Frockumentary like you've never seen before.
Extended and Deleted Scenes - missing scenes from an earlier edit of ep. two.
Continuity - BBC1 continuity announcements from the original transmission.
Photo Gallery
Isolated Score
Easter Egg - Mat Irvine talks about the Gundan axes and his own on-screen role in Warriors' Gate.
Coming Soon
PDF Material
Programme Subtitles
Production Notes
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The Doctor and Romana trapped in another universe, E-Space! - Rating: 4/5
This is certainly a wild adventure. The Doctor and Romana are on their way back to Gallifrey when they encounter some kind of anomaly that sucks the TARDIS into another realm, E-Space. Now they find themselves trapped with seemingly no way out. Trying to escape this other universe, the Doctor and Romana have many exciting adventures involving a group of stranded space colonists and deadly marsh men in "Full Circle", a group of intergalactic vampires who threaten not only this universe, but both universes in "State of Decay", and finally you have a slave ship run by a group of ruthless humans who have found a way to inslave an inter-dimensional species in "Warriors' Gate". And in their travels, they encounter a young new companion named Adric who is native to E-Space. It's great fun! The only sad thing is that at the end of "Warriors' Gate" we see the departure of two beloved companions, Romana and K9. Goodbye lovely Romana. And goodbye you faithful tin dog whose "a dead-shot with a nose laser".
"Full Circle" gets five stars from me while "State of Decay" and "Warriors' Gate" gets four. In all, "The E-Space Trilogy" is truely epic and is highly recommended!
It's about -TIME-, timelord. - Rating: 5/5
The knew they would come round to releasing the e-space trilogy. It was a good quality set of stories and well produced(though JNT was inferior post Tom Baker's departer). My childhood memories are built on these three more than the others though most of the second half of TB and Romana, MT, LW were my Doctor Who EXP as a child of the 70s/80's in my pre and early teens. If you want good quality tales, celebrity quality acting, and a good main cast topped off with keen special effects(for the time) as well as and etheric and subtle muzak(Paddy Kingsland radiophonics) and atmospheric lighting/sets, then this is your verse, E-space. I do not yet know what features the DVD set have but I am reviewing the show because I watched it countless times(State of Decay) on my VHS recording I made in highschool and I am accurate in the point of the DVD, the story, because can be!
