Some Fantastic Place: The Only Game in Town

This is astounding. Here's what I was reading forty years ago:

Two reprint titles

...and thirty years ago:

I love the internet. Now, more time travel...
This month's Doctor Who Monthly declares the third season of the series (1965-66) as "the most eclectic and daring collection of adventures yet". I would argue that it saw a flurry of companions come and go; it effectively put an end to the Pure Historical story for about 15 years; and most of its monsters - the Drahvins, Monoids,War Machines - were unsuccessful and never seen again (of course, two races, the Visians and the Refusians couldn't be seen at all).
I find much of the season unrewarding to watch or listen to, especially The Massacre, The Savages and The Celestial Toymaker. The RT 10th anniversary special unforgettably described that antagonist as "an evil force who dominates a fantasy world. He is a happy- looking mandarin character dressed in a splendid bejewelled coat".

In the one b/w episode that remains, Dodo (one of the most unappealing companions of the Sixties) and Steven (Peter Purves,one of the best), all dolled up in the latest Carnaby Street modes, play a series of deadly- as in "deadly dull"- parlour games. It's a gimmick that works far more effectively in episodes of The Avengers, most notably Game, the first instalment of the Linda Thorson season.

The Toymaker was supposed to return in the mid-1980s but budgetary requirements for the launch of Eastenders -and alleged personal acrimony between Michael Grade and Colin Baker - saw the show going off-air for a year. The story, set in Blackpool and written by Graham Williams, the producer of Tom Baker's most giddy and eccentric adventures, finally saw publication as a Target book in 1989. Big Finish chose to adapt it for audio twenty years later to launch a series of tv scripts that were never produced.

Here's my take on it on MySpace, in 2010: "... the first of the much-ballyhooed Lost Stories, The Nightmare Fair, was a forgettable outing for the Werthers Original softer incarnation of Sixie. This audio interpretation of an 80s tv script not only suffered from squeaky, farting music cues but also over-familiarity from the Target book. As a sequel to one of the dullest Hartnell stories, it lacked bite although it does have attractive white-and-purple packaging." (Ow! http://www.myspace.com/dugald/blog)

This week, on a second listen, it is a bit tiresome and simplistic but what really baffles me is why anyone would want to homage such a dismal period of the show's history: the spiky Doctor in his clown costume; whiny pneumatic Peri; the poorly-paced episodes...The plot, such as it is, involves the Toymaker developing a killer video game. Any tabloid panic about the evils of Space Invaders was long forgotten by 1986 so the whole creaky enterprise has the feel of a rather cursory comic strip.
Of course, the original Toymaker was played by 90s Alfred, Michael Gough, who is now in his 90s. David Bailie, the insane Taren Capel in Robots of Death replaced him in the role and subsequently appears in Solitaire with Masterchef's own India Fisher.

Charley Pollard is one of the most popular and longest-serving audio companions with the unique distinction of having accompanied the Eighth and then the Sixth Doctor- the first Who Girl (or Boy) to travel with different Regenerations out of chronological order. In this story- taking place, continuity mavens, during the second McGann season in 2002!- an amnesiac Charley is forced to play the Toymaker's games. Intriguingly, the actor styles himself in lower case as "david bailie" but his performance in both plays is too mannered for my tastes. I also found his sonorous voicing of the living game ("Pllllllaaay!") verged on the comical. However, I did enjoy hearing the "Edwardian Adventuress" again - even if she did actually hail from the Thirties.

Last night I watched this:

An animated movie in the Japanese anime style. Didn't like it at all. I'm not interested in the contemporary take on Batman: murky, psychological horror and military fetishism. Even the Lego computer game ad appealed to me more. THIS is the Batman I like: