Latest / A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast / Talks to Jason Thompson about his choice of The Sea Devils (4/6)

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Talks to Jason Thompson about his choice of The Sea Devils (4/6) · A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast

• 0:23
  None. Hamster with a blunt.
• 0:34
  Pen Knife for doing Quicker, quicker, quicker.
• 0:40
  Welcome back to a hamster with a blunt penknife.
• 0:43
  The Doctor Who Commentary podcast.
• 0:46
  Jason, I've got a question for you.
• 0:48
  No, I do. Have you ever gone down in a
• 0:56
  submarine? No.
• 1:02
  In any of the possible ways that question can be interpreted, no.
• 1:07
  Oh, you must have a string of very unsatisfied ladies in your
• 1:10
  life, then. I'm oh, sorry.
• 1:13
  So we're here, then? We're here today to talk about
• 1:16
  the Sea Devils episode. Four indeed we are.
• 1:20
  Normally the point in the 6th part where we're going to
• 1:23
  struggle a bit, but I don't think that's going to be the
• 1:24
  case here. We've just reached an excellent
• 1:27
  cliffhanger with the first Sea Devil Sighted Coming coming
• 1:32
  along the English coast. Second, Sea Devil, because there
• 1:34
  was one in the Fort in episode 2 that dived out the window.
• 1:38
  You know the bit where he does his sonicking now with the
• 1:42
  minefield? Yeah, I have favorite memories
• 1:45
  of that being in more than 30 years in the TARDIS.
• 1:48
  Am I imagining that? No, I think it probably was.
• 1:51
  It's the bit where that woman goes.
• 1:53
  You know, I'd go anywhere with John Purley because he's just so
• 1:55
  damn sexy. Do you remember that bit?
• 1:56
  Yeah, I remember that bit. Everyone's here, I can.
• 2:00
  Think of only. Two people that can get away
• 2:01
  with freely shirts. Jacket and a girl fronted shirt
• 2:04
  Jimi Hendrix and John, it's. A great documentary there isn't.
• 2:09
  It it is good fun. I like, I like when they try,
• 2:13
  attempted to remake iconic scenes.
• 2:17
  The dinosaurs in London. The Autons.
• 2:21
  Yeah, it was a it was a really nicely done documentary.
• 2:24
  There was a Blake 71 as well. You know that they did, but they
• 2:26
  never released really. They unleashed it on YouTube,
• 2:30
  but for whatever reason they couldn't bring it out as an
• 2:32
  official release. Oh, I've not seen that.
• 2:35
  Yeah, that's good. It's very, very good.
• 2:38
  Well, look, I'm ready to dive straight into the Sea Devils 4
• 2:42
  if you are. I am very ready to dive into the
• 2:44
  Sea Devils episode 4. Then give me a count in.
• 2:47
  In 321, here we go. Straight down the Time Tunnel.
• 2:56
  Is this like the Doctor Who titles are always supposed to be
• 3:00
  quite scary? Is this a bit too colourful to
• 3:02
  be scary? Quite possibly, yeah.
• 3:05
  It's very, very bright. I always a bit dubious about the
• 3:11
  colours that show up on these things now because we know these
• 3:15
  episodes have been junked and black and white and colour
• 3:19
  recovered and tweaked and all sorts.
• 3:21
  So I'm never sure how much of the colour is as it would have
• 3:24
  been in 1972. Certainly in things like the
• 3:28
  Clause of Axos where it's Purpley or you know, the Mind of
• 3:32
  Evil and Terror of the Autumns where it's basically pink, so
• 3:38
  never sure about that. But it is very brightly
• 3:41
  coloured. It's taking full advantage of
• 3:42
  the fact that we've gone to colour.
• 3:44
  That's whack as much brightness into this as we can.
• 3:47
  You know what astonishes me is given that we live on an island?
• 3:51
  Yeah, with many coastal towns. It's how rarely Doctor Who went
• 3:56
  to the seaside. Yeah, it's not common.
• 3:59
  And it goes on location a lot. We're usually sort of somewhere
• 4:03
  on the M25, within reach of London.
• 4:06
  But I mean, why is it sad? Curse of Fenrick.
• 4:09
  Curse of Fenrick at Dulworth Cove.
• 4:12
  Enemy of the world? Enemy of the world?
• 4:14
  Yes. So we start the Leisure Hive in
• 4:17
  Brighton on Brighton Beach. Yeah.
• 4:20
  But there's not a lot it. Just feels like there's a lot of
• 4:22
  opportunity there and. There's a lot of good coastal
• 4:27
  areas. I mean, the War Games gets close
• 4:29
  because it goes to the Cookmere Valley where the little meanders
• 4:33
  and things are, but doesn't actually go to the sea front.
• 4:36
  It's gorgeous around there. A lot of people don't visit.
• 4:39
  I used to. Live I I take them up there and
• 4:42
  we reenact the Romans coming over the hill.
• 4:45
  I've done that with many Australians that's visited.
• 4:49
  Oh, look at it, Purpley Band of action straight on the barbed
• 4:51
  wire. Straight on the barbed wire.
• 4:55
  This is 1. Point where Joe maybe?
• 4:56
  Is a little bit. I've just noticed there's a beam
• 4:59
  mic that gets into shot there on the bottom left.
• 5:01
  Oh, I missed it. Yeah, didn't mind.
• 5:04
  Oh, I think this was my this was my uncle's biggest objection is
• 5:08
  like, obviously the eyes technically should move, and
• 5:11
  that's how we should see about. But this poor sea devil's got to
• 5:14
  move his head left to right all the time.
• 5:17
  Should their eyes move? As I said, there's plenty of
• 5:19
  creatures whose eyes don't move in the sea, so.
• 5:22
  I mean, you know, you know when you buy a whole fish and the
• 5:25
  sort of deadness in the island, that sounds like a bit like
• 5:27
  that, don't it? I.
• 5:29
  Honestly say I never do, but I used to walk past the Fishmonger
• 5:32
  every morning on my way to school, just as they'd laid out
• 5:35
  the ice with all the fish on it, so quite often saw those and a
• 5:38
  couple of lobsters. Is that a dead seagull?
• 5:41
  Probably yes. I've never.
• 5:42
  Noticed that before? Why is there a minefield on this
• 5:44
  beach? Well, it is a military
• 5:47
  installation. They don't want people getting
• 5:50
  in or off the island. This is quite extreme.
• 5:55
  They could just post a guard. Yeah, they could.
• 5:59
  But then you don't have. The drama at this thing, do you?
• 6:01
  The explosions. Tearing from the sand.
• 6:05
  Indeed. I love the scream.
• 6:10
  If there's one thing Docs who I think 10 times out of 10 got
• 6:15
  right, it's the sound effects. Yeah, the sound effects,
• 6:19
  especially in the 60s and 70s, were brilliant.
• 6:23
  The soundscapes in the 60s in particular were.
• 6:26
  Superb. It's it's interesting on the
• 6:29
  50th anniversary album. Did you get that?
• 6:32
  I don't think I did. No.
• 6:33
  So there there are some scores in the 70s, but mostly it's
• 6:37
  soundscapes like Dick Mills, soundscapes like Metabellius 3
• 6:42
  service and things like that. And when you listen to them,
• 6:45
  sort of divorce from the IT takes your mind somewhere
• 6:49
  incredible. It does.
• 6:51
  I remember had the The Doctor Who Sound Effects LP, although I
• 6:54
  had it on audio cassette and a lot of the sound effects on
• 6:56
  there are the atmospheric sounds like better be this 3 the Exelon
• 7:00
  city. Does it have the Croton sound
• 7:02
  effects on it? It doesn't even know it's those
• 7:04
  it. Didn't have those.
• 7:05
  I can hear the Croton sound effects if I I recognise that
• 7:15
  fella as well, the one in the orange suit.
• 7:17
  Oh, he's probably cropped up somewhere else, so I'll have to
• 7:20
  dig out my Doctor Who actors in Doctor Who thread from Twitter
• 7:23
  and find. Out post it below please.
• 7:26
  Yeah, we've had based on decision part one, we're now
• 7:31
  doing based on the siege again in Part 4 it's.
• 7:33
  The Melting doors. I love all this and the music's
• 7:36
  great, the music. Really builds?
• 7:38
  In this scene. And then you do get that scream
• 7:41
  again, but I think it's quite effective here and everybody
• 7:46
  looks suitably scared. They do like a Steven Moffat
• 7:50
  story where they're all walking around being sarky buggers.
• 7:53
  Yeah. The artillery looks realistic,
• 7:58
  the set looks great, you know. So I was telling me, right in
• 8:05
  the 80s, the mid 80s, a lot of people were harking back to the
• 8:12
  purple era as being the golden age of Doctor Who because it was
• 8:16
  the complete opposite of what they were getting then, you
• 8:18
  know, garish colours and camp comedy and all of this.
• 8:22
  Don't you remember that? I don't remember it as such
• 8:26
  because in the mid 80s I was much younger but but I can
• 8:31
  believe it. But it's stories like this where
• 8:35
  I can see why myths like that came to be.
• 8:39
  Yeah, and this is one of the most solid stories in the whole,
• 8:46
  Not only in the whole purple era.
• 8:47
  The whole thing, I think, to be honest.
• 8:52
  Oh, I love this, the master just tells Trenchard.
• 8:54
  They're going to come out the sea and conquer the earth.
• 8:57
  Yes. I think Trenchard comes across
• 9:02
  as very naive here. I mean, he's always fairly
• 9:05
  naive, but. Yeah, he is very naive, but he's
• 9:07
  also, I think you kind of get the feeling that the poor guy is
• 9:10
  now in too deep in the situation to do anything about it.
• 9:19
  Here they go with their on horseback and cars.
• 9:22
  I mean, the budget for this, Yeah, there's no need for there
• 9:25
  to be a mounted card on a. Horse.
• 9:29
  And the fellow's not even driving the car.
• 9:30
  He's there, you know, riding the car.
• 9:34
  Yeah, there's there's no need to have a horse, but we have a
• 9:38
  horse that plus some bizarre. Comedy music, though, I'm not
• 9:41
  sure about that. What's that called?
• 9:45
  There's a word for that when the music directly informs the
• 9:48
  action. Yeah, I can't remember what it
• 9:51
  is, but yes, I mean. The master literally looks like
• 9:57
  he's dressed up to be evil now, isn't he?
• 10:00
  It's like he is. Yeah.
• 10:02
  Was he? Was he, was he that allowed his
• 10:05
  clothes as a prisoner? Why?
• 10:08
  Fetch me my evil gal. Fetch me my evil outfit.
• 10:10
  It's time to rip the mask off. Yeah, here we go.
• 10:15
  Yeah, I believe it was the propellers at the back of the
• 10:17
  sub, wasn't it? That they're so.
• 10:21
  Oh, actually, this is great as well.
• 10:23
  It's all sort of done silently, isn't it?
• 10:25
  It is, yeah. Cedeville grabs his hand and
• 10:28
  says, take us there. I think they almost work better
• 10:38
  mute than when they actually start having a conversation
• 10:41
  later on. Do you not like the voice?
• 10:43
  I like the voice. I like what they've done with
• 10:45
  the voice, but I also think this mute creature that they're
• 10:48
  trying to communicate with. And I think it works quite
• 10:52
  nicely. And it's unusual at this point
• 10:55
  as well because the Sea Devils have taken over, but they
• 11:00
  haven't killed everybody. They are now using the crew to
• 11:05
  get where they need to go. And yeah, I I quite like that
• 11:09
  one. I'm sorry, Doctor, but I don't
• 11:11
  believe a word of it. Well, I can assure you we didn't
• 11:13
  walk 10 miles here to tell you fairing stories.
• 11:17
  I like this. What?
• 11:18
  See, I could have done with a bit of this in the latter.
• 11:21
  Partly stories between him and the Brigadier because it was
• 11:24
  very spiky like this in season 7.
• 11:29
  There's Joe Joe doing all the exposition.
• 11:31
  And like you see, Jason? This is one of those weird
• 11:33
  moments. It's kind of, I think it's
• 11:35
  called the Mandela Effect, where you remember things wrong.
• 11:40
  Because I remember seeing this sequence of the Joe going, they
• 11:44
  want to take over the Earth and retake and the Doctor going, you
• 11:48
  know, let me do the talking. And in my head until I saw it on
• 11:51
  VHS again in my head he went, no, no, Joe let me do the
• 11:54
  talking. You see, they want to take over
• 11:57
  the Earth. And that's that was stuck in my
• 11:59
  head until I saw the video. Instead, he's just scoffing a
• 12:02
  plate of sandwiches. Scoffing a plate of sandwiches,
• 12:05
  I. Mean.
• 12:05
  This is awful. Look, he goes to give Joe the
• 12:08
  the scruffy bits of lettuce that's left on the plate.
• 12:11
  There's some pretty limp looking sandwiches as well, frankly.
• 12:14
  They've cut off the crusts. They'll have no airs on his.
• 12:17
  Chest in the sandwich. It's cheese, apparently.
• 12:20
  Is it? Yeah.
• 12:21
  Yeah, it's. Just terrible that it's the
• 12:25
  inverse of RHIP and Day of the Daleks, isn't it?
• 12:28
  Yeah, Joe, how thoughtful. Love that so.
• 12:34
  Oh, he's. Coming around finally 4.
• 12:37
  Episodes in live there. I'll get you some more
• 12:42
  sandwiches. So because the submarine is has
• 12:51
  lost contact now, This is why we go down in the diving belt and
• 12:54
  that's the sequence where I think the pace stops completely.
• 12:57
  It's a sort of a 5 minute sequence of him getting in it
• 13:01
  going down. I do love the shot of the sea
• 13:04
  devil at the window. Where his old.
• 13:05
  Pops and goes. Hello.
• 13:08
  Oh. Telegraphis Bowman's popped his
• 13:10
  head back out. We've always forgotten he was
• 13:11
  there, but there he is. We've not seen it for a while,
• 13:13
  have we? He has a couple of moments with
• 13:16
  Jane Blythe, doesn't he, where there's a suggestion that
• 13:19
  they're quite familiar. Maybe.
• 13:23
  That's Hulk again, though. I think Hulk has that Rusty
• 13:26
  Davis thing of taking incidental characters given them moments,
• 13:31
  yeah? Yeah.
• 13:36
  Yeah, you see how he's just sort of playing about with those
• 13:38
  buttons there like that. It reminds me of the master
• 13:41
  going across the chess board in the five doctors he's just sort
• 13:45
  of making. It up, Making it up as he goes
• 13:47
  along, yeah. Yeah, cowboy, he's clearly
• 13:51
  fucking sending a signal. Change the treasure.
• 13:53
  Will you wake up? Oh, he's given some thought to
• 13:59
  it, so I'll have to give the authorities notice.
• 14:04
  I do like the fact that they've got a badge for this castle,
• 14:07
  this security thing that that sort of S shaped symbol that
• 14:11
  they've got, just the the little details that they put.
• 14:14
  Into anything, you know, the the uniforms that the guards are
• 14:17
  wearing Terrorists takes Michael Bryant's task and he goes, well,
• 14:21
  what on earth are they wearing? And it, he goes, that's the
• 14:25
  uniform of special master, Guards says.
• 14:28
  Michael Bryant And you can just see Terrorists Day.
• 14:31
  I mean, you can't see it because it's a commentary.
• 14:32
  You can imagine. Giving him a.
• 14:33
  Poison look. Oh, here they come.
• 14:37
  Is this day for night? Because it's very dark.
• 14:41
  Or is it the end of the day I? Think it's probably day for
• 14:43
  night? Quickly.
• 14:44
  Get the shot in we're losing the sun.
• 14:46
  Probably got a filter on the lens for.
• 14:48
  It but there's 123456 Sea Devils there.
• 14:50
  Oh devils, and here is God. There's another six.
• 14:53
  Definitely not the same six, of course.
• 14:55
  I believe we might see another six in a second.
• 14:58
  Only different 6 Sea Devils. Naturally, they should have
• 15:00
  shaken up the numbers. Made it 5.
• 15:02
  Maybe every time it's six it makes it a bit obvious.
• 15:10
  Oh, here we go. So he is trying to do his duty.
• 15:12
  He is trench on, actually trying to.
• 15:15
  To do something. So do you remember the sequence
• 15:17
  in the book? It's been a long time since I've
• 15:20
  read the book, but I do remember the bit where after he's been
• 15:25
  killed. So he doesn't.
• 15:26
  He leaves a safety catch on, doesn't he?
• 15:28
  So he he doesn't. Hart turns off, takes off the
• 15:32
  safety catch so that he won't be thought of as a an.
• 15:36
  Idiot. Idiot going out.
• 15:38
  That's a lovely. Time that's really, really
• 15:40
  lovely is it's. That's one of those moments that
• 15:43
  a lot of people talk about in the books, of how you can
• 15:45
  embellish the stories without changing any other plot details
• 15:48
  or anything like that and just adding layers.
• 15:51
  That picture was on this desk, though.
• 15:53
  Is that his mum and dad? I don't.
• 15:54
  Know I didn't see him. Yeah, look, he knows like the
• 15:58
  masks stops are no good. Yeah, the masters giving up all
• 16:02
  pretence at this point. The.
• 16:06
  The direction I really love here, because we see him
• 16:10
  shooting, we don't see his death.
• 16:13
  The Sea Devils walk in in a completely sort of mute
• 16:16
  sequence. There's no dialogue and then one
• 16:19
  moves aside and the camera just zooms out onto his body in the
• 16:22
  corridor. That's a really nice bit of
• 16:24
  direction. It's.
• 16:24
  Very well done. It's yeah, looking away from the
• 16:28
  bits that you don't need to see. We know he's going to die.
• 16:31
  We don't need to see him actually shot down by a sea
• 16:33
  devil. You know what Michael E Bryant's
• 16:35
  doing? He's honing his craft on Doctor
• 16:37
  Who, and I think he does have the occasional off day.
• 16:41
  I think those effect sequences as they're going through the
• 16:44
  mine shaft of maggots in the Green Death are a little.
• 16:49
  Otherwise, they're. Not great and.
• 16:51
  They have some moments in Revenge of the Simon Men as
• 16:53
  well, which are less than compelling.
• 16:57
  But you know where we end up? Robots are deaf, which is I
• 17:02
  still think it's one of the best directed stories ever.
• 17:09
  Here we go, 2 Special Master Guards.
• 17:11
  We're about to have have it. Oh.
• 17:16
  Sorry, I'm not supposed to be laughing.
• 17:20
  You should have seen me when I was watching Resurrection of the
• 17:22
  Daleks. Death's in that.
• 17:25
  Disco death. That was so authentic.
• 17:31
  Well done. You've been exterminated by a
• 17:34
  darling or two, then? Well, it's all twice.
• 17:36
  I actually tend to the security of my prisoner.
• 17:39
  I love Trent. Charlie is an absolute idiot.
• 17:42
  But. That's great.
• 17:46
  They look, oh, some Sea Devils darker than others.
• 17:50
  Some are green, some are brown. They're sort of brown on
• 17:52
  location and green in the studio, which is a bit weird.
• 17:55
  It's the same also, right? I don't know.
• 17:58
  God the maybe the colour they went in the sea.
• 18:00
  The colour drained off the mask. There we.
• 18:01
  Go. There you go.
• 18:02
  There, yeah, look. At that that's that's brilliant
• 18:05
  piece of direction. And you look, all of this, the
• 18:09
  sort of they're nodding their head, switch over around the
• 18:11
  crash room on the master. It's grey.
• 18:14
  It's dramatic it. Is.
• 18:21
  And that's good. That's a a a very traumatic set
• 18:25
  piece right in the middle of the story.
• 18:27
  Well, I think you kind of need it.
• 18:28
  Yeah, you definitely need something big.
• 18:31
  And we're shifting away from the prison now because Trench is
• 18:34
  dead. Yeah.
• 18:35
  So that plot that is effectively over.
• 18:38
  Yeah, that's it. Trench is dead.
• 18:39
  The whole master is a prisoner thing.
• 18:41
  No, the master is now fully in control.
• 18:43
  Oh. But I will say, I think the
• 18:48
  Master's far more effective being smooth as in the prison
• 18:52
  than he is when he's down in those Sea Devil sets sort of
• 18:56
  going, no, don't listen to the Doctor the.
• 19:00
  Humans will destroy you. Yeah, so this is the bit that he
• 19:07
  embellished in the in the book where Hart just flicks off the
• 19:12
  safety catch from his pistol. And the tide has turned as well
• 19:17
  with Captain Hart. Now he's on size.
• 19:20
  We've got the full force of the Navy behind the Doctor, and that
• 19:23
  truly comes to bear in episode 6.
• 19:26
  And you also get the feeling in this sequence that you know,
• 19:29
  because we saw in Episode 2 when Trenchard tried to do the
• 19:33
  diversion by talking about golf, the bit where they find
• 19:36
  Trenchard's body. You do get the feeling from the
• 19:39
  way Richfield plays Captain Hart.
• 19:41
  You believe they knew each other and he has just lost.
• 19:44
  Maybe not a friend, but a colleague that he's known for
• 19:46
  many years. That sequence earlier where he
• 19:49
  comes in and he's talking about the Gulf and he's going, oh,
• 19:52
  John, not now. And all of this.
• 19:54
  Yeah, there's a familiarity, isn't there?
• 19:56
  There is. And so that sequence there, and
• 19:59
  they say they explained he used the Master, used Trench's
• 20:02
  patriotism against him and that's a that's a whole that's a
• 20:07
  very Malcolm Hulk, yeah. Thing to do, and there's whole
• 20:11
  arguments about how you can Patriotism can be used as an
• 20:17
  excuse for doing some really shitty stuff.
• 20:20
  I bet I don't remember the book. I've got it on the shelf.
• 20:23
  Maybe I should read it again. I bet that that leads into that
• 20:27
  more in the book. Just like the Doomsday Weapon
• 20:30
  LED into that very cynical view of the future, in The Doomsday
• 20:33
  Weapon far more I always feel like whole I get.
• 20:37
  A bit seasick in these sequences.
• 20:40
  I love being on the water, so it just feels like I'm on the
• 20:42
  water. Are you good on water?
• 20:44
  I. Am not good.
• 20:45
  On water, no. You can go on a cruise ship
• 20:47
  then. Certainly not, no.
• 20:49
  I've done cross channel a few times and obviously the Island
• 20:52
  White Ferry. I did a we did a sightseeing
• 20:55
  tour around a cruise around Malta on our honeymoon and there
• 20:59
  had been a storm the previous night.
• 21:02
  We didn't know that a ship had been run aground on that storm,
• 21:05
  although it wouldn't have gone, but where the where the ship was
• 21:09
  moored because the water was still quite choppy.
• 21:11
  The gangplank was going up about four feet and waving around.
• 21:14
  So if you had somebody holding on to it, waiting for it to come
• 21:17
  down and then going, OK, one, two, wait.
• 21:20
  And then he'd wait for it to come down again, OK, 1/2 three.
• 21:24
  Oh wait, he's like, OK And I spent half that sightseeing tour
• 21:29
  laying on a bench on the deck because I felt so queasy.
• 21:31
  Bless you. Then we got round the other side
• 21:33
  where it was calmer and I was like, oh, that's much better.
• 21:36
  But yeah, the first half of that tour I was lying down going, I
• 21:38
  will not be sick. I will not be sick.
• 21:40
  I will not be sick. So no, I do not do well on
• 21:42
  water. I I literally.
• 21:44
  Just had a holiday like a three, four day holiday on Mark's
• 21:48
  parents boat and we just went up and down the river loads.
• 21:52
  It was great. Had a wonderful time, yeah.
• 21:55
  No, I I get terribly motion 6. Yeah, we do.
• 21:58
  We stall now after that, after that brilliant set piece in the
• 22:02
  prison and you know, and I get it, we're showing off some more
• 22:05
  hardware and it's great. They've got a real diving bell.
• 22:08
  And again, it's beautifully. It's all beautifully done.
• 22:11
  The sets are done, well done. The moment where he comes
• 22:13
  through the window is well done. But I don't know.
• 22:16
  Did you like this cliffhanger? He's gone, you know.
• 22:21
  Well, duh, we sort of knew that. I think maybe we shouldn't.
• 22:28
  Oh, look, he's got bald. Kate Manning does tell that
• 22:33
  story about his bald spot Well. He's in his 50s at this point.
• 22:36
  Now, yeah, you just don't think it, do you?
• 22:38
  Because. He's so dynamic.
• 22:41
  That's what they all you know, when everyone when Peter Capaldi
• 22:43
  took on the role, isn't it? Oh my God, we can't have a
• 22:45
  doctor in his 50s. It's like what William Hart or
• 22:48
  John Pertwee. They were in their 50s.
• 22:50
  I'll tell you all my objection to this Now this feels like a
• 22:53
  documentary to me. Less, less of a.
• 22:56
  Drama more of A. Now we're on to a let's show off
• 22:59
  the hardware that we've got access to.
• 23:01
  But they do that later on. They do that in when they've got
• 23:04
  the hovercraft and everyone coming out of all the gums and
• 23:06
  all of that. But that's really, really
• 23:08
  exciting. Yeah, this is a bit of a
• 23:11
  laboured, yeah, we, we know he's gone, right?
• 23:15
  Like, it's no great surprise. Yeah, it does.
• 23:18
  Take a long time to go down and then it's winched up so quickly
• 23:24
  that he would have probably got the bends anyway.
• 23:27
  The bends. I've not heard that for a while.
• 23:32
  What I do like though is they save a huge amount of the budget
• 23:38
  for those last two episodes, like the action quota in those
• 23:41
  last two episodes. This really ends on a high.
• 23:44
  Yeah, another multi level set there where they descended.
• 23:47
  Some manners to get in makes it all a bit more authentic.
• 23:50
  But as well, sort of the the oxygen dials and the the
• 23:53
  canisters and all of that that are around, it's a a thoughtful
• 23:57
  set designer. And you know, I'm going to say
• 23:59
  it again, that's not always the case in Doctor Who.
• 24:02
  Do you remember Car Fell? Exactly.
• 24:08
  Hang on a minute. He's like, he pops his head in
• 24:13
  to say hello. What brings you down here on the
• 24:18
  seabed, eh? And.
• 24:21
  What is that bizarre contraption that they take him away in?
• 24:26
  And how do they transfer? Him So it's like a sort of air
• 24:31
  lock. There's that four again in the
• 24:33
  background. Where?
• 24:34
  Oh, yeah. Oh, you see Kate Manning there?
• 24:38
  Do a little, little jump. Yes.
• 24:41
  OK, We've seen it go. Down.
• 24:43
  We're now going to see it come up.
• 24:45
  Come up and. We'll open it up.
• 24:48
  Someone will go in. Their heart goes in, doesn't it?
• 24:51
  Heart goes in, then Joe goes in. Then Joe goes in.
• 24:56
  Yeah, there there have been more exciting cliffhangers.
• 25:00
  Definitely. I mean, they were using those
• 25:06
  diving belts way back, weren't they?
• 25:07
  Like, that's that's an old piece of equipment, even at this
• 25:11
  point. Oh, she's a bit quicker than I
• 25:18
  thought. That came up quite fast
• 25:20
  actually. It.
• 25:21
  Did ludicrously so. But you could have had heart.
• 25:24
  Go in and go. He's gone.
• 25:26
  Couldn't you? No.
• 25:28
  We cannot resist because Katie Manning's got such a beautiful
• 25:31
  face. And she does.
• 25:35
  Katie Manning's brilliant in this and in general, and I
• 25:40
  watched this in 1992 when it was on BBC and my first part.
• 25:46
  We my first Joe Grant story and so on and so forth.
• 25:51
  If you had told me in 1992 that in 2023 I would be sitting in a
• 25:57
  cinema with hundreds of other Doctor Who fans and watching the
• 26:01
  Sea Devils on the big screen with Katie Manning, sat in the
• 26:04
  audience with us, I'd have thought you were insane.
• 26:08
  We had no way that would ever happen.
• 26:10
  And yet, there it was. The opportunities that are
• 26:13
  afforded to this fan, though, we're incredibly lucky.
• 26:16
  Oh, it's brilliant. It is brilliant.
• 26:18
  You. Yeah, because we were there
• 26:20
  together. We both went to a utopia with
• 26:22
  Katie Manning as well. Didn't.
• 26:23
  We we did. Did you Did you meet her up
• 26:25
  close and personal with that? And I'm not suggesting any
• 26:28
  impropriety there at all. Yeah, and I've met her three
• 26:31
  weeks previously at Devil's End and again the year before that
• 26:34
  as well. She.
• 26:34
  Started to recognise you now. Yes, Yeah.
• 26:39
  So. Did not see you 3 weeks ago.
• 26:41
  Well. She said she she posted on
• 26:43
  Twitter the day before the Utopia convention about going up
• 26:45
  there, and I said I was looking forward to it.
• 26:47
  Haven't seen you in, oh, three weeks.
• 26:50
  She laughed. And then, yeah, when she saw me,
• 26:52
  she's like hello. And she because I saw her in
• 26:54
  Devil's End three weeks before Utopia.
• 26:59
  But I'd also seen her in there the previous year.
• 27:03
  And so I didn't go to get her autograph or anything that there
• 27:06
  was in. But I did say just want to say
• 27:07
  hello again. It's nice to see you again
• 27:09
  because I saw you last year. Oh, of course you did.
• 27:10
  Yes. And she remembered.
• 27:11
  And she said, you know, sometimes people say, oh, yes,
• 27:14
  of course. So you know, they don't actually
• 27:15
  have a clue who you are. But they can pinpoint something.
• 27:18
  That you did together, but. She did Remember Me and yeah,
• 27:21
  and again on Utopia, so yeah. That's like Colin with me, you
• 27:24
  know, the first time he flirted with me.
• 27:26
  The second time he pecked me on the cheek, he goes, oh, I wonder
• 27:28
  what's gonna happen next time with me, Please.
• 27:32
  But. And I've said this before on
• 27:34
  hamsters, but it's worth repeating.
• 27:37
  Katie Manning always has the longest queue at every
• 27:40
  convention I ever go to. And that is because she insists
• 27:44
  on giving everybody a couple of minutes of her time.
• 27:47
  They're paying good money to see her, and she makes sure they all
• 27:51
  get a moment make. Sure.
• 27:52
  They get a moment and I remember seeing somebody saying, yeah, we
• 27:55
  need to, we need to stop Katie from talking to everybody.
• 27:58
  So you are not going to stop Katie from talking to everybody
• 28:01
  you know, at the BFI? Someone said, oh, there was a
• 28:04
  car booked about half an hour ago.
• 28:06
  You. Know.
• 28:08
  You know what? What they what these people are.
• 28:10
  Why would you book a car so soon after the finish of the
• 28:13
  screening? You know she's going to want to
• 28:15
  hang around. And I feel I'm very fortunate
• 28:18
  actually, because although I didn't get her autograph at
• 28:22
  these, I think, so I already got it at the first Devil's End
• 28:24
  convention. I was fortunate enough to see
• 28:28
  and photograph for them a couple of people's first meeting with
• 28:32
  her. Oh, that was.
• 28:33
  Brilliant. Amazing.
• 28:35
  What a lovely gift for them and I'm glad I was able to get those
• 28:37
  pictures for them so. The funniest thing I ever
• 28:41
  remember about Katie Manning was the second time I went to
• 28:43
  Utopia. So at the same venue.
• 28:46
  And she's at the door, right, with a group of fans just
• 28:49
  gossiping. And she goes, oh darlings, I
• 28:52
  really must go, you know, my train is in half an hour, blah
• 28:55
  blah blah. And I went off and had some food
• 28:58
  and came back an hour and a half later and she's still there and
• 29:01
  she said. Oh darling, so I really must go
• 29:04
  like that. And I thought, like I'll come
• 29:05
  back an hour later. So she really, really does.
• 29:08
  She gives people their moment and I think for a lot of people
• 29:13
  I I I don't really, that's not what I go to the conventions
• 29:18
  for. I don't really need those
• 29:19
  moments. But for a lot of people it it
• 29:23
  means a great deal. So.
• 29:24
  It absolutely it. As I said, I'm, I'm, I'm
• 29:27
  privileged and pleased that I was able to capture those couple
• 29:30
  of people's first time meeting her.
• 29:32
  Some some actors, and I'm not gonna name it names For some
• 29:34
  actors it is just sort of a factory line of sign it right
• 29:38
  next. You know, she knows there's an
• 29:40
  experience. So, well, let's send the episode
• 29:43
  there on some Katie Manning love.
• 29:45
  Absolutely. But also as well, the way she
• 29:48
  can embellish a story in the commentaries, the ones with home
• 29:51
  Barry Letts are the best because he's sitting there going, Katie,
• 29:53
  Are you sure that's what happened?
• 29:55
  Because I do remember it being a lot, a lot subtler than that,
• 29:59
  darling. No shit, I'm telling my.
• 30:02
  Story.