Doctor Who novel v tv version

andyrooThu 06/03/08 10:44

Having lived in Ireland during the 80's and not started watching Who regularly till 74/75 much of my introduction to WHO stories was via novelisations so often I came to see the televised ersions much later. It has given me perhaps a different perspective on the series. With the great exception of the Hinchcliffe era many of the tv productions failed to live up to the book version. Classic examples: The Daemons, Claws of Axos, Terror of the Autons, Planet of the Spiders, very little from Tom Baker era, Castrovalva (love that novel). the five Doctors, Warriors of the Deep, The Two Doctors. The greatest surprise the other way was Caves of Androzani where I couldn't understand why all the fuss emphasising just how much Graeme Harper's direction added to the whole thing

fracture_childThu 06/03/08 19:01

I prefer the novelisation of Ark In Space. It's so much more macabre! Same with The Sontaran Experiment. I remember being really disappointed when I first saw Spearhead From Space that the Nestene looked nothing like the illustrations from the book.

IMO the best novelizations was Remembranbce of the Daleks which built on an already fantastic story and served almost as a pilot for the Virgin New Adventures.

I put a sly little reference to the Target novelizations of the Auton stories into my own novel.

ragingwhoremoansSat 08/03/08 16:29

quoting > "I remember being really disappointed when I first saw Spearhead From Space that the Nestene looked nothing like the illustrations from the book. "

The worst offender is the edition of Terror of the Autons I had as a child. It was one of the first Dr Who books I boughgt and its cover was a convincing painting of a very scary one-eyed octopus/ crab creature (http://www.drwho-online.co.uk/episodes/targetbook_terroroftheautons2.jpg). It wasn't until years later when the story came out on video that I discovered there wasn't anything even vaguely like it in the TV version - not even the tentacles you see in Spearhead from Space. It's just some blue energy stuff that looks a bit like a hand. Disappointing to say the least. And then, when they brought the Nestenes back in the new series they weren't even vaguely octocrabular. Still, I'd like to think the Bane in The Sarah Jane adventures were a tribute to the Target Nestenes. Though I expect I'm wrong.

fracture_childSat 08/03/08 23:05

quoting > "Still, I'd like to think the Bane in The Sarah Jane adventures were a tribute to the Target Nestenes. Though I expect I'm wrong."

I think you couldn't be more right!

viceSat 08/03/08 23:07

The novelisation of Remembrance of the Daleks was so different to anything that had gone before. So much back story, and so much characterisation.

I agree, a baseline for the New Adventures that were to follow.

allthisandlessSun 09/03/08 11:00

on the reverse of this does this mean that Human Nature can be considered too...?

The only thing I was really disappointed by in the television version is that they didn't use the balloon in the same way...

fracture_childSun 09/03/08 12:44

And there's the whole 'Dalek' and 'Jubilee' issue too!

andyrooSun 09/03/08 21:16

most edited book of course has to be the war games, 10 episodes told in 140 pagesm a little more than the 2 arters got

bigd1972Tue 11/03/08 08:36

Yeah, those books were fantastic and they turned me into a right little bookworm when I was a kid. I've spent a small fortune on ebay recently, reliving my childhood and replacing a lot of those books that went to jumble sales many, many years ago.

The early books really did expand on the TV shows, although they did seem to get a bit slimmer in the late 1970s/early 1980s when poor Terrance Dicks was knocking one out every month.

I used to love the Malcolm Hulke books, as there was always lots of backstory and even the baddies seemed to have a proper motivation.

fracture_childTue 11/03/08 19:07

quoting > "I used to love the Malcolm Hulke books, as there was always lots of backstory and even the baddies seemed to have a proper motivation."

It's heavily implied in the Dinosaur Invasion novelisation that Professor Whittaker is gay. Unfortunately, reading it now, the characterisation is worringly close to a homophobic carricature and Hulke makes it clear that virtually everyone despises the professor.

andyrooThu 13/03/08 12:23

yes, it;'s a great book, miss dawson is really fleshed out as well, quite a sad character

have to say at the time, missing the tv versions, all i really wanted were faithful adaptations of same so loved the terrance dicks model of 3 chapters representing one episode each so i could always guess where the cliffhangers fell

also, i have a theory that seeds of doom episode 5 originally ended earlier supported by the fact that the chapter ends when sarah is being strangled rather than when they are locked out of the house, episode 6 is also very short. Philip Hinchcliffe wrote the novel and may have recreated the story's intended episode structure. Any thoughts? I would guess that the sight of a traumatised Sarah being strangled may have been too much for the audience and he was mindful of the then very active lobby against horror in Dr Who