The colour of War (Games)

So here was a bit of a surprise when it was announced recently… with the colourised Daleks serial having performed to what I presume were expectations, Russell T. told us a few weeks ago to expect this similarly reworked Patrick Troughton farewell story, and here’s me got my virtual hands on it just before Christmas. “War Games” seemed like an interesting choice, it gave us possibly the most important expansion on the show’s mythology, and if nothing else it should at least have technical advantages (having originally been shot on 625-line tape and existing as stored-field films) over “The Daleks”.

“The War Games” was originally a ten-part extravaganza which came about as part of the general chaos of the 1968-69 production season, with two other serials having fallen through and forcing the team to expand this one to unexpectedly great length… traditionally I gather it’s generally thought of as nine middling episodes and then one great episode where the Time Lords finally catch up with the Doctor and put him on trial, but I’ve actually always thought it was the other way round, with the first nine being pretty good and the tenth the kind of ho-hum one (I must say some details of this episode, like the Doctor’s potential new faces, are addressed kind of brilliantly in the new edit). Whatever, “War Games” was an important tale, ending the monochrome era of the show, answering its longest-standing mystery to that point and clearing the decks (with the three leads all having handed in their notices) for what was basically a reboot of the whole thing.

So the colour version is abbreviated to a mere 90 minutes from over four hours, mostly to good effect, colour’s technically pretty good and the additional music isn’t too egregious for the most part (even if sonically it jars a bit with the dryness of the original 1969 TV studio sound). The cutting of so much material does, however, affect things negatively sometimes, particularly when it comes to some of the secondary characters like the Resistance members, and the Germans are basically nowhere to be seen, rendering the character of Von Weich a bit confusing (I don’t recall him being disposed of either, unless I just missed that).

The really contentious point, though, are probably the details that have been added. I’m really not sure what I think of the use of a certain famous musical sting to imply the War Chief was actually the Master, which is an idea that’s been used in various non-TV media over the decades (let’s not get into THAT vexed issue) but I think this is the first it’s been addressed on TV. Even if it is a “special” edition, I don’t think I like it.

More egregiously, though, we now have the hitherto unseen regeneration of the second Doctor into the third. Unseen, that is, if you haven’t previously seen this:

This comes from a Youtube channel called The Confession Dial, whose proprietor made this CGI “bonus scene”, if you want to call it that, to bridge the end of “War Games” and the beginning of “Spearhead From Space”. And the BBC have since acquired this and, with a few changes (I did quite like the way the TARDIS approaches the Earth as the Nestene meteorites from “Spearhead” do), incorporated it into this new edition. And the show’s already complicated continuity just got another new wrinkle added, cos this complicates things by effectively wiping out the “Season 6B” theory, which is a fan theory that was kind of semi-officially endorsed to explain problems posed by the second Doctor’s later appearances on the show. Again, in a special edition of this serial, so who knows if it “counts” or not.

Anyway, that’s what I thought about “The War Games” in colour. Technically quite an improvement on what they could do to “The Daleks”, fairly well cut-down though it could’ve benefitted from maybe another 20-30 minutes being retained, and sonically less egregious than what they did to “The Daleks”… just a bit bothered by the additions, as noted. How was I not going to have at least some reservations? Anyway, it’s made me want to revisit the original, plus we have actual new Who coming in the next few days too…