The Daleks in Colour

The Doctor, Ian, Barbara and Susan land on a planet that appears to be dead, but just as they're about to set off, Ian spots a fascinating city, an exploration would change the world forever.

First of all, why the release, and the cynic in me seems to think it's to keep on with the commercial releases, we've had the DVDs, box sets, vinyls and blu rays, this means a few more guaranteed releases over the next few years.

So, The Daleks is a favourite of mine, easily my most watched Hartnell, so the idea of tampering with is was just not right.

Let's applaud it for bringing it to a new audience, one that simply cannot watch black and white.

The visuals were decent, I liked the colourisation, what I didn't like was the music, it jarred with the episode quite badly.

The scene I thought worked incredibly well was Barbara's first encounter with The Dalek, the music worked there, and that scene was given a whole new, threatening vibe, I really liked it.

The updated dialogue and special effects, I can't really say I thought they were necessary, some worked better than others let's say.

I get why people dislike it, I can also see it appealing to a new audience, so overall, it's a slow moving thumbs up from me, maybe my score is a little kind, anniversary celebrations and all that.

7/10.

Certainly a fascinating experiment - The Daleks serial re-colourised for the anniversary events in late 2023 and it although it looks compelling the drastic editing of the original story is ludicrous. Especially as the Tales of the TARDIS (which appeared at the same time) features the full serials with only the titles and end credits edited out, this felt like a leap too far. Excising whole chunks of the story and mashing up scenes to make it seem more pacey and more modern just makes it look silly. It feels like an experiment gone too far - a set of choices that didn't need to be made. Give me black and white and creaky 60s pacing any day.

On viewing this so called film, it was at the beginning just rushed and ruined, it is far more superior in the TV series, The music soundtrack was a mess with too much dominating every scene you watch, on this it seems that let's put some music here and hope for the best, but most of all the editing from 175 minutes down to 75 minutes was not enough time, it even worked at the normal 95 minutes, but it in common sense would still have. Been rubbish, the people who produced this need to be sacked Modern blockbuster of which they tried to make made it even more of a shambles.

The colourisation of the TV show was not bad, In all the BBC have failed at this project, please stick to the original TV Doctor Who: The dead Planet.

The rating here is mainly for the colour. The colourisation was well-done. While it doesn't look like it was shot in colour originally, it's a good substitute.

However, the edit here was not good. 175 minutes have been cut down to 75, and that is simply not enough time. The story feels incredibly rushed, with entire scenes cut down to only a montage of a few seconds in places, it genuinely gets hard to follow what's happening at times. There's no opportunity for tension to build up, everything is over before it has a chance to really begin.

And the music just ruins it. They've tried to make it seem like a modern blockbuster, but that's simply not what the footage was shot for. The music is overbearing, dominating every single scene it's in.

If you want to watch The Daleks, watch the original. Watch it in multiple sittings if you must, as it's 3 hours long. And if you want a shorter, more colourful version, watch the 1965 movie adaptation, "Dr Who and the Daleks". I see no reason at all to bother with this version.

It should be noted that one of the BBC's stipulations regarding this colourized release of The Daleks, was that it needed to be kept to a 75 minute run time. There was no going against this order. The production crew obviously did their best to pare down the original 175 minutes, but the result is a disjointed mess.

The colourising is for the most part beautifully accomplished. One hopes this process will be put to other classic black & white episodes of the series. However, if any further conversions are produced, editing should be better controlled if not entirely abandoned. As presented, The Daleks-Colourized is 75 minutes of choppy story telling. Many scenes are rushed and others seemingly disorganized. In some instances, characters that were in a scene one moment, are gone the next, though they are not seen leaving nor given time to leave. In another instance, the Doctor and others are trapped on the upper floors of a tower, soon after they are on the edge of entering a jungle with no intervening explanation of their escape.

Other than editing, newly produced music pours over scenes like invading slime, covering dialogue and clashing with action. Choice of music during a scene set in the Dalek Control Room is ponderously bizarre. New special effects, however, are for the most, excellent. Hopefully additional colourized episodes of B&W Doctor Who will be produced without unjust editing. Soundtracks, if not religated to the original, should have a better fit and volume.

A worthy experiment, especially for the brillance of colour. A rating of 5/10 from me.