Dan loves science fiction and fantasy in just about any format. He has so many shelves full of dvds and books that there's no where for him to sleep. One day he hopes to add his own novels to those shelves. You can contact him at dcollins@troughtonismydoctor.com
But all good things must come to an end. Tonight I listened to the last episode, Death On Baker Street. The amazing folks over at AMAudioMedia.com courteously provided me with an advance copy of this final episode, letting me be among the first to hear the completed version, and I am honoured!
So, what can you expect from this final episode without getting too spoilery? Stuff. It happens. Lots of it. Oh, a little too vague there? Okay, well in the last episode we see the Doctor going to his dark place in an attempt to learn the truth behind the brutal Jack the Ripper murders. He finds out, but gets more than he bargains for. Who are the Illuminatios and what is their connection to all of this? Where do the Watchers fit in?
This is my favourite kind of final episode. Jammed full of info and surprising reveals sandwiched between great action scenes and trademark humour from our two heroes. And, of course, you are left wanting more!
It’s been fun talking to Mike, Andrew and Clayton over the past couple of months and getting the word out about this awesome project. But they aren’t done yet. Not by a long shot. Next week I will post an interview with the guys about the future of Dark Journey!
Here are some links to other media who have been supporting them!
The last episode of Doctor Who Dark Journey will go live Saturday July 5th at 5:35. The moment has been prepared for, as I have heard someone say before. I sat down with Andrew ‘the cool beans Doctor’ Chalmers, Producer Mike Tamburro and Clayton ‘Claytec’ Turner for another interview discussing the series so far. We talk about the humour, the darkness, Season three of Dark Journey featuring the Master as a stay at home mom… You name it. Andrew had a large glass of red cider, so there was no stopping him! Warning, there is spoilers about the previous four episodes here, so why not check them out before you listen to the interview!
This job is all about the perks. When you’re a big time Doctor Who site like TIMD, you get a lot of freebees. Okay, that’s a complete fabrication, I’ve yet to get anything free because of the site, but you know what I did get? An exclusive early listen to episode four of Doctor Who Dark Journey!
Episodes two and three were dark, edgy. As I previously mentioned, I think they were more about building the Andrew Chalmer’s Doctor, hinting at some of the emotional trauma he’s suffered, showing a darker and grittier side. Moving on to number four, entitled Emily Looks To The Stars, it felt like I was in the sun again after being under a dark cloud!
Out of danger and finally having a rare moment of relaxation, Holmes and the Doctor again rekindle the easy camaraderie they had when they met in episode one. They interact like old friends who have known each other their whole lives. Oh the banter! The first three minutes of this story are the funniest so far in Dark Journey and many of the quips rival some of the best from the new show. Seriously.
“It’s the age old story, lunatic cult member meets girl, girl meets lunatic cult leader. It’s all so romantic.”
To top it all off, they even reference the production staff’s favourite Canadian band, Rush! Don’t get too comfortable and think that this penultimate episode is nothing but warm fluff. Halfway through things start to get intense and it races forward to a conclusion that will have you begging for the next and final episode.
Oh yeah and there’s a great Downton Abbey joke too.
So, if you haven’t started along the Dark Journey yet, what are you waiting for? All the episodes are up online at AMAudioMedia.com and episode four, Emily Looks To The Stars will be up Saturday June 28th at 5:35!
Well, it’s official! We have a date and another tiny little teaser trailer! After such a long wait, it’s great to finally know when the new series is starting up! Looks like the first episode is to be called “Deep Breath.”
Emotionally shattered after a tragedy, the Doctor arrives in London and becomes companion to Sherlock Holmes in an effort to stop Jack the Ripper’s murderous trail of terror. But is there an even greater evil at work in Victorian England?
This is the premise behind Dark Journey.
Episode one was fast and full of witty dialogue. The plot moved along pretty quickly, Holmes and the Doctor had to come together and start unraveling the mystery. It had a bit of a light hearted feel, maybe because there was so much banter.
The second installment is very different. Yes, there still is some great interactions between between two of the most brilliant men in all of fiction, but the plot slows down. This second episode is more about emotion, atmosphere and building character than it is about moving the story forward a lot. That’s not to say that the plot doesn’t move forward. It does. But I don’t think that’s the main point of this episode.
Rather, they start to build up their own version of the Doctor. In the various interviews I have done with the AM Audio guys, they talked about how Andrew Chalmers version of the Doctor is different from the others, how he is darker and we start to see that here. He hints at losing someone he loved and drowns his sorrows in drink after drink at the local pub surrounded by women. Events start to take an emotional toll on him. And I’ve been promised this is just the beginning.
Happy Father’s Day to everyone out there who celebrated yesterday! I know there are a lot of proud dads who love spending time watching Doctor Who with their kids, and a couple of great dads who work on the site, myself and Gary!
So, what did you miss last week? It wasn’t a super busy week, but we did have some cool stuff!
Not only was it Father’s Day, but there was a birthday to be celebrated last week! That’s right, the omnirumour turned one! Oh I remember when it was so cute and cuddly as a newborn, now it’s running around and throwing toys and generally misbehaving…
Doctor Who Dark Journey!
Episode two of Dark Journey went live on Saturday and stay tuned for our review of that one, but here’s our review of the first episode. If you haven’t had a chance to listen to the interview I did with Mike, Andrew and Clayton, be sure to check it out. You can head over to AM Audio Media and listen to the episodes and see a quote from my review as their page header!
Former Doctor Who Script Editor Andrew Cartmel talks to TIMD’s Martin Ruddock about the omnirumour, what he did and didn’t know, Pip and Jane Baker and a whole host of other interesting topics! Talk a look, you will probably be surprised!
So, that’s what made our news over the past week. Follow us @troughtonsmy
Oh, doesn’t time fly? One day your baby is just a newborn in tiny clothes that are too big and then before you know it they’re out of diapers and running around the house like crazy. That is the spirit in which I wish the omnirumour a Happy 1st Birthday.
That’s right. One year ago today the news hit the internet. The omnirumour was born. Oh sure, it had been kicking around the dusty ME forums for a while prior to that, but I consider that it’s conception (continuing with my analogy) while it’s true birth was one year ago today.
As we blow the candle out on that cake, and make a wish (we’re all wishing for the same thing, I am sure), I present a repeat for your reading pleasure. Here is a little piece I originally wrote for Doctor Who Worldwide back in January, celebrating a different milestone!
Dr. MEWlove Or: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Omnirumour
January 14th is a little bit of a milestone for me, one that I celebrated quietly on this very site. It’s not really important like my wedding anniversary or my kids birthdays, hell it’s not even something my wife wants me to talk about anymore. That’s because on January 14th my family will have been hearing my omnirumour conspiracies for a whopping seven months.
Oh, I remember June 14th very well. It was one of those warm summer days that always fill me with nostalgia. Even though I’ve been out of school for more than a decade, I still feel happy and optimistic toward the end of the semester. My brain’s hardwired to enjoy those last few weeks in June, remembering the thrill that comes when you’re set free from the confines of class and able to laze about for two months.
So I was already in a great mood when my friend Jamie came in to work. He was a recent Who convert, having spent most of his life thinking the show was more suited for his Dad than for himself. Over the course of a year my enthusiasm for the show and Matt Smith’s tenure in particular, eventually won him over and he gave it a shot, starting with “The Eleventh Hour.” I don’t know if it was love at first sight or not, but he became a fan and we’ve spent many hours discussing new episodes.
On this particular day he dropped the bombshell. “There’s a report on the internet that they found all kinds of lost Doctor Who episodes!” He said gleefully. And I stopped breathing. Literally. Even though he was a fan, Jamie had never delved into the classic series, so he didn’t really know what this news meant to me. Yes, he was aware that there were a number of classic episodes destroyed by the BBC and that my favourite Doctor, Troughton, had lost practically all of his stories. But there was a big difference between our two reactions. To him this was a “oh, that would be cool if they found them” sort of thing.
But to me it was like being struck by lightning.
A few years previous I had been sitting on my bed surfing the web. I was supposed to be writing, trying to finish up a novel that I had been working on for quite a long time. My wife was in the other bedroom trying to get our one year old daughter to sleep. It was always a challenge, the toddler hated going to bed and most nights we would have to rock her to sleep, sometimes spending hours with her in that dark room. I had hit a road block in my editing and decided to waste a little time looking at my favourite Doctor Who news site. My heart stopped when I saw the headline proclaiming that two lost episodes of Doctor Who had been found and screened at the Missing Believed Wiped event. I was so excited I fist pumped the air and hopped up and down. It was only with the utmost self-restraint that I kept myself from barging into my daughter’s bedroom and telling my wife the fantastic news. This was one of the greatest days in my life.
So you can imagine how I felt when suddenly confronted with the possibility that many episodes were found. My emotions ran free and unchecked for a moment and I doubt $50M lottery winners were as excited as I was, hopping up and down and making a complete fool of myself. After a minute I felt the tug of reality and tried to rein everything in. “That would be awesome,” I told him. “But you know you can’t believe everything you hear on the internet.” With extremely limited web access as work, I knew there wasn’t a chance of finding anything out right away. It would have to wait until I got home from work.
Those were some of the longest hours of my life. The clock ticked slower and slower as 5:30 neared, but eventually it was quitting time and I took off for home, ignoring everything and everyone on my way. Once there I burst through the door, side stepping my wife and kids to run straight for the computer, anxiously twitching as I waited for my trusted Doctor Who news site to load up. And I was devastated when it did. There was nothing. No report of missing episodes found. No rumours. Just a boring release about the latest issue of Doctor Who Magazine.
Frustrated I grabbed my phone and sent Jamie a coded text that read “…” That’s it, three dots. We had come up with the response earlier in the day. It was the fastest way I could tell him that he had gotten my hopes up for nothing.
I pouted around the house for a few hours, inconsolable. Yeah, I didn’t really think that the rumours were going to be true, but still… Eight o’clock came around and it was time for the kids to go to bed. I read them a story and tucked them in. With no other distractions I headed back online, determined to find the source of the rumours that Jamie had passed along. It only took me a moment before I traced them back to Bleeding Cool and I laid my eyes on that site for the very first time.
“Will Doctor Who Have A Very Special Surprise For Us In November?” It said and under the headline was a picture from Evil Of The Daleks.
It was a defining moment in my Doctor Who fandom, one that changed my life forever. I abandoned my previous Doctor Who site immediately. No more waiting for official news, no more being completely in the dark. It was time to embrace the speculation and love the omnirumour.
That’s the end of my original article. Here we are six months after I wrote that and we’re still no nearer to actually seeing anymore of those episodes. The wait has been hard on a lot of fans, some more than others, but at least something good has come from it. Friendships. I have made several awesome friends over the past few months with DWW and TIMD, and don’t forget about the Doctor Who Missing Episodes Discussion Group on Facebook. So, even though no more episodes have been announced, many of us are still better off than we were before.
Having said that, I would still like to see some more of those episodes…
An ominous peel of thunder, the thud of footsteps, an unearthly voice and a gruesome murder. The Doctor shows up on the scene thinking he will be able to solve the Jack the Ripper killings, little did he know he was the second smartest guy in the room.
Say hello to Sherlock Holmes.
This is the first of a four part audio adventure brought to us from the folks at AM Audio Media in Toronto. A couple weeks ago I had the chance to speak with Mike (MA) Tamburro and just a few days ago did an interview with Mike, Andrew ‘the doctor’ Chalmers and their audio wizard, Clayton (Claytec) Turner. In those interviews we discussed the origins of this story and the challenges behind making it. After talking, tweeting and writing about Dark Journey for more than a month, I was extremely excited to listen to episode one!
Entitled The Doctor Meets The Great Detective, it doesn’t disappoint. It sparkles with imaginative dialogue, wit and charm, everything that you have come to expect from both the Doctor Who and Sherlock franchises.
“I’m the Doctor. Mr. Holmes, I wouldn’t mind going with you!”
“For myself, one loyal doctor will suffice, in his absence I chose to work alone.”
The Doctor is used to being the one with all the information, so it’s great to hear Holmes reading him like an open book. Before you get concerned, let me tell you that our man more than holds his own going toe to toe, synapse to synapse with Holmes!
Mike and Andrew are both big Doctor Who fans, so much so that they timed the release so it would coincide with the Saturday 5:35 time slot the show used to occupy. The story is crafted much like any classic Doctor Who, it even ends in a cliff hanger. Overall, Clayton did a phenomenal job. The production values are good. Many of the voice actors are top notch, even some of the smaller parts like Inspector Gull feel authentic, though I’m not so sure about the New York reporter (that’s an in joke, you’ll need to listen to the interview if you want to understand).
What about the Doctor? After all, this is Doctor Who. You can’t just have anybody portraying our favourite Time Lord, right? Well, okay, I guess in reality anybody could, but that doesn’t mean that they’re going to be good and believable. Chalmers is both. His Doctor is quick with the jokes and sarcasm, displaying a little of the goofiness that makes me love Matt Smith’s Doctor. He’s also dark and razor sharp when needed. Plus he has his own catch phrase, cool beans!
“Sarcasm, the lowest form of wit, my dear Doctor,”
“But the most enjoyable, my dear Holmes.”
So all in all, I would say that Dark Journey is a must listen for Doctor Who fans, especially if you are interested in the Big Finish adventures. I can’t wait until we get episode two in the coming weeks
Welcome to a special edition of the Monday Morning News Round Up!
Special? You betcha. Welcome to the Dark Journey Round Up. Saturday the good folks over at amaudiomedia.com launched their fan produced Doctor Who audio adventure Dark Journey. Episode One – The Doctor Meets the Great Detective went live at 5:35pm local time. Have you had a chance to listen yet? I would recommend you take eleven minutes out of your day and check it out!
Lead cast members Andrew Chalmers (The Doctor) and Roy Miranda (Holmes) during recording
Earlier in the week I had a chance to sit down and Skype with Mike, Andrew and Clayton, three of the masterminds behind the project! You can check out that interview as well as more information about the project. And stay tuned because later today I will be posting a review of episode one!
Oh, but there’s more. As a part of #FanProducedFriday, where we try to highlight fan projects, TIMD interviewed Dave, who produced the amazing tardis console you see here!
Okay, on to the real news. Or lack thereof. Have you been waiting for The Underwater Menace to come out on dvd? Well you might be waiting a little while longer. Even though amazon has it listed to preorder, Steve Roberts says the dvd range is dead.
Sometimes you learn unexpected things from people. I’m lucky enough to have a job where I get to talk to a lot of great folks. My love of Doctor Who usually starts the conversation and I have discovered many neat things from people over the past few months.
One day a conversation about Horror Of Fang Rock took an unexpectedly awesome turn when I found out that Dave had built a tardis console in his garage! As soon as I heard about his hobby, I knew that I had to find out more about him and his do it yourself tardis console.
TIMD: What prompted you to make a full scale replica tardis console?
Dave: When I first discovered Doctor Who as a kid I dreamt of building a console and Police Box. Now I have kids of my own. A few years ago our oldest was very interested in Doctor who, but also somewhat scared by it. I showed her some Classic Series and talked about how the effects where done, thinking that understanding the way it was created would make it more disarming. We talked about how many parts of the classic series we could recreate at home. In the end we wrote some scripts and talked about filming some new stories of our own. The idea sort of snowballed and before I knew it I was building. It has been a great thing to play at with the kids.
TIMD: How did you get all the details for your design? Did you look for blueprints online or just go by what you could see in the tv show?
Dave: I started with a long look at the ‘tardis builders’ website. When I was starting the BBC was not publishing any blueprints for anything DW 2005 or newer, and they made it clear that there would be legal action against anyone who did. So that meant a lot of re-watching episode clips, looking at screen captures. Having said that I do not know that my console is 100% to scale. I took my scale by going from known objects like the trim phone and extrapolating from that for the panels. The over all scale was taken by looking at many images of David Tennant beside the console and working out its size from his proportions.
TIMD: I know a lot of people will be looking at this and saying ‘I’d love to do that, but I don’t have the time or the money.” So, how much time and money did it take?
Dave: You are trying to get me in trouble with my wife! Ha ha. Actually it cost much less than I think most people would think. Most of the console is scratch build. The plywood and Masonite that make up much of the frame are scrap from my old work and pieces I had around the house. Many of the purchased pieces came from charity or second hand shops. Most of the money spent was on paint and surface treatment. It is a prop and some elements are more approximations than others.
TIMD: Where did you start? What part of the console was the first to be bought/made?
Dave: I found an amber coloured bubbled glass ball paperweight at ‘Home Sense’ just like one of the ones used on the console and bought it. After that I jumped in with both feet and started making the ‘ribs’- the large framework that hold the panels in place.
TIMD: Was there something that you had to do over and over again to get it right? Or has everything fallen into place easily?
Dave: Some bits where much easier than others. A lot of the console has fallen into place. The outside ceramic looking rim of the console was the single trickiest bit. That was mostly because I had some ‘clever’ ideas about how to make it easily. These included using an old kiddy pool, carving it out of Styrofoam, and moulding plastic- none of which really worked for me. In the end I used plywood to block out the form and clad the surface with Masonite much as I had done with the ribs.
There are a number of smaller components that are what one might call good enough (for now) that I do hope to replace or upgrade when it becomes realistic to do so. I would still like to upgrade the plastic on the central time column too.
TIMD: What was the one single most expensive piece?
Dave: Most of the pieces are built or adapted re-purposed objects. I did identify two ‘trim wheel throttle assemblies’ from World War II era planes. If I had purchased those they would have cost hundreds if not thousands of dollars. As it was I did purchase a real vintage trim phone and a large sextant. The sextant cost about $70 when all was said and done.
TIMD: How long has it taken you to make your console?
Dave: It has been about two years on and off. With most of the work happening on weekends and some evenings.
TIMD: What sort of reception has your console gotten from online fandom?
Dave: For the most part very positive. There is a real community of builders out there that have been immensely helpful and encouraging and have helped to keep me going and motivated
TIMD: Do you run around mashing the buttons and playing with everything?
Dave: When our kids were very young they had something called an ‘exer-sauser’. It is a rotating seat made with a ring around it with bits that rotate, rattle, click and make various noises. Yes it is very much like that with the addition of flashing lights
TIMD: So, I’m guess that’s a yes! Have you ever set up a tv on your console and watched Doctor Who in there?
Dave: No oddly I haven’t, yet. There is a monitor built into the console. It is hooked up to a very old computer system to run the scanner graphics. This old computer that is the ‘heart of the tardis’ is old enough it doesn’t have a DVD drive. But some day I will upgrade, And then- you know what I’ll be watching!
TIMD: Has anyone ever paid you to have their picture taken at the console? If not can I be the first?
Dave: The console is sadly temporarily in storage while we are doing some remodelling to our house, but when it is reinstalled you can certainly have photos of it and with it my friend!
TIMD: Have you ever thought of trying to make it portable so you could take it to conventions?
Dave: I did take the console apart and take it to the ‘Reversed Polarity’ DW convention last November in Toronto. It is not easy to take apart and reassemble, but doable. The reaction was great from fans. Though I didn’t hear it from him I was told that Graeme Harper also really liked it
TIMD: Graeme Harper? Amazing!
Dave: Many fans and cosplayers took the opportunity to have photos taken with it.
TIMD: When did you first get into Doctor Who?
Dave: I think I was about 8 years old when I first started watching it on a PBS from buffalo, then later on TVO. It was so different and exciting I was hooked. My grandmother knit me a scarf and I made a really bad plastic K9 body cover for my remote controlled car. Yup I was hooked!
TIMD: Looks like even back then you were interested in do it yourself Who stuff! Who is your favourite Doctor?
Dave: I have to say Tom Baker. Though I love Hartnell, and Davidson and others. Baker was my first and his first few years seem to me to be a real golden era of the classic series.
TIMD: What’s your favourite episode from the Classic Series?
Dave: There are so many to choose from. If I am to pick one though I will have to say Genesis of the Daleks. I still remember watching as Doctor number four paused questioning if he had the moral authority to commit genocide, even though the Daleks were evil. The idea has stayed with me and when I think of the Doctor I think of him like that; moral, non-combative and questioning.
TIMD: And of course that infamous scene where Davros contemplates having ultimate power. Still chilling to watch! Do you have a favourite from the New Series?
Dave: Again, there are so many to choose from, Blink, The Empty Child/ The Doctor Dances… if I were to choose one I would say the Family of Blood/Human Nature. It seems to me to one of the few New series historic set stories that isn’t just a romp. It tackled some very really themes around the anniversary of WWI about the loss of innocence and the nature of war. It was a story unlike any other where we get to see different sides to the regular characters plus some great guest characters and cast.
TIMD: What do you think about Capaldi?
Dave: I haven’t seen him enough to know, but I am really looking forward to seeing what he brings to the role. I am very excited for the new season to get under way.
TIMD: Thanks for the interview Dave and I will definitely take you up on your offer of a photo at the console once it’s back up!
If you want to follow Dave’s progress with his tardis console, you can check out the builders forum, and just for fun, here’s a YouTube video showing Dave having a little fun with the console.
Troughton Is My Doctor 