Or rather the champion restoration team who are doing the Doctor Who DVDs. I've been watching the first two parts of "Talons of Weng-Chiang," one of my favorite Who serials, with the popup commentary on. The picture is bright and clear, and the sound clear. Of course, this is compared to my old, washed-out copy from WGBH, where the picture shimmied every time a plane flew over and was shot through with electrical interference from God-only-knows-where.

"Weng-Chiang" is a wonderful period piece about a Victorian music hall and the Chinese magician it employs (a front for a visitor from the future who talks about Time Agents, giving speculation to a theory that Captain Jack Harkness of the new series would have been one of these), and two of the most delightful supporting characters in Who history, the bombastic but cowardly music-hall owner Henry Gordon Jago, played by Christopher Benjamin (just recently in the new series episode "The Unicorn and the Wasp"), and Professor Litefoot, the courtly elderly pathologist played by Trevor Baxter. (Jago and Litefoot were so popular that a series was considered for them.)

Other things this particular serial is known for: a hideously bad fake giant rat, and, oh yeah, Louise Jameson as Leela running around in wet Victorian underwear.

Labels: DVDs, science fiction, television

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 6:38:00 PM

Comments:

This one was always one of my favorite Doctor Who's, too.

# posted by  Ivan G Shreve Jr : 6:13:00 PM

 

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