The Doctor and friends arrive in the middle of one of Earth’s most brutal wars, but it’s not long before they realise this is all part of a much grander, and even deadlier, scheme…

I say “not long” because at way under half its original length this story has been edited to run at quite a lick. It’s a mere 26 minutes in, a fraction over the length of one classic series episode, that we see the War Lords on their home planet, a key event ordinarily about an hour in. With the groundbreaking events of the final episode (and the new coda sequence) taking up a quarter of an hour one can see just how truncated everything in between has had to be – about six and a half episodes squished down to the running time of two. The fact that such a thing works at all is a credit to editor Benjamin Cook and everyone else involved.

Having said that…why so short? Last year’s The Daleks in Colour suffered from the same issue and that lost only about half its original running time in contrast to this production’s three-fifths. In my review for that I said I wished it had been allowed another ten or fifteen minutes to let the story breathe, and I know I wasn’t alone in thinking that. I’m obviously not privy to the specific circumstances and remit of this production but I feel like 90 minutes must have been an imposition on the edit, presumably budget-based, rather than a natural choice. Cutting this story down is perfectly reasonable and doable (co-author Malcolm Hulke did just that himself with his novelisation) but I really can’t see how or why, given any wiggle room, an hour and a half would seem sufficient.

To be fair it’s reasonably followable as far as I can tell, although it’s hard to judge being quite familiar with the original – it’s always been a favourite. A first timer may well have had a different experience and a quick look at a Reddit viewing thread seems to confirm this suspicion. With the focus on the War Lords’ base (now with a Thunderbirds-style exterior shot) we lose much of the “Earth” action from the later episodes, the rebellion more or less just turns up, with comedy Mexican Arturo Villar seemingly popping up, sans any context, out of nowhere. We’re also sadly deprived of David Troughton’s first speaking role in the show as Pvt Moore, although happily we get to see veteran EastEnder Rudolph Walker as Harper, albeit briefly.

The colourisation is once again the least controversial aspect of the presentation, easily overcome by those who object to such things by fiddling around with the remote. It’s a story that at first glance wouldn’t seem to benefit hugely, there’s a lot of khaki and various shades of brown for obvious reasons. Once we get to the War Lords’ HQ though things get a lot more fun and frankly groovy as the original’s valiant attempt at b&w psychedelia gets fed a small handful of ‘’shrooms. It’s not too over the top but it’s pretty to look at, lots of red including Philip Madoc’s John Lennon spectacles. A special shout out to whoever had the unenviable task of colouring in all those magnetic control pieces the War Lords use – it would have been vastly simpler (and lazier) to have made them all the same colour so well done you.

In an attempt to be fairly spoiler-free I’m not going to go into detail about some significant amendments made to the events of the final episode, other than to say I rather enjoyed them, they’re quite cute and if not now then when? The much-publicised coda is no spoiler – we get the regeneration into Jon Pertwee’s 3rd Doctor. This is actually taken, with permission, from a fan production and it’s fun if not always convincing.

Mark Ayres returns to provide new music. I felt it was much more sympathetic to the original than The Daleks’ rather (intentionally I suspect) anachronistic action-movie score. There’s also a piece from Murray Gold, originally from Series 3 and used here as something of a statement regarding a popular fan theory, along with a certain nu-Who sound effect. I’ve seen the internet and the cat is already having the time of its life among the poor pigeons. While I don’t subscribe to the theory (to be honest, I couldn’t care less either way, I’m not that sort of fan any more) it’s a fun embellishment to a project that isn’t taking the place of the original unless you want it to.

Verdict: Please do more, I really like this idea, but please let it have the budget and whatever else it takes to allow the stories to be told properly. You need some of the downtime scenes, the character pieces and the occasional rest from all the action in order to release the tension from time to time. 7/10

Andy Smith