Doctor Who - The Tomb Of The Cybermen [1967] [DVD] [1963]

If the tale has a weakness it perhaps lies in the simplicity of the supporting characters- there are good ones and there are bad ones, and they all seem capable of behaving in the most illogical way at times. However, Troughton's Doctor is a treat to watch, and the whole piece is laced with excellent humour and even some insight into the Doctor's past.

The picture has been especially restored for dvd release and is now pristine; a detailed synopsis guides the viewer through the restoration process. And there are plenty more extras on this generous disc. Hopefully this release will pave the way for more of the sixties material to be represented on dvd alongside the seventies and eighties stories.

The story is set on the home planet of the Cybermen in the far distant future where the Cybermen are just archeological relics to be discovered and studied, having been extinct for sometime. The Doctor, Jamie and the new companion Victoria stumble across the archeological team who have just discovered the entrance to the Ttombs. From there they whole group come to discover the delights and horrors waiting for them in the Tombs.

Patrick Troughton's Doctor is a relevation to me personally. He is both restraining and gently cajoling to the archeological team, giving them the answers they want to revive the Cybermen, but viewing the unfolding drama with fascinated horror, one moment manipulating events in the background, the next taking charge. There is some great interplay between the Doctor and Victoria too. And the scene of the Cybermen being thawed out from the impressive cocoons still sends a shiver down the spine 35 years on. Yes there are one or two dodgy special effects but you can see how this terrified children and adults alike in 1967!

This is classic stuff (without giving too much away). The quality of the picture and sound is great and the little documentary on how they restored the episodes (splitting the picture showing before and after restoration)shows how much work was put into this release. All the other extras are great to see but the highlight is the 8mm footage of the special effects ending of the previous story 'Evil of the Daleks' (no longer in existence bar Part 2) matched with the actual soundtrack of Part 7 with the Daleks being blown up left, right and centre.

Lets hope that more Doctor Who DVD's are put together with the care of this one, with more restored and digitally remastered prints, particularly the Hartnell & Troughton years. And lets hope they find some more classic Troughton stories currently missing because if they are anything like this then they deserve to be found!

That's not to say the good Doctor doesn't even get himself into dire straights on more than one occasion in the course of this story. Yet it's always because of his sense of responsibility and duty to stopping the reawakening of the Cybermen, who have been nicely frozen in their buried tomb until the intrusion of a bunch of multi-cultural intergalactic archaeologists.

This story is not without its problems. The most foremost is the cheap plot device by which one character leaves a weapon unattended and the non-cyber bad guys take full advantage of their stupidity. It happens more than once. I also took issue with the racial make-up of the crew. The black man Toberman seems very much the 'noble savage' stereotype and the other human bad guys seem to talk with quasi-Asian accents. Perhaps this was Doctor Who trying to get to grips with race issues for the first time. In which case, it stumbles.

What surprised me, however, was the production values. They're not as bad as Doctor Who from the 1960s was famed to be. The Cybermen are no worse than they were several decades later, though their leader, the Cybercontroller, does look like he was patched together on a Doctor Who special of Blue Peter.

Aside from that, this is Doctor Who doing what it does best - making the most out of its limited resources. This story takes us back to the infamous gravel pits, but there's no chasing around the same rock for half an episode. There's constant reference to the sabotaged rocket ship, yet we never see it. We don't need to. We never even see the TARDIS materialise. Again, we don't need to.

For a story that really only uses three sets and a couple of location scenes, it gives the impression of a larger world and a larger threat. Sure, the acting is full of theatrics and the script doesn't call for much more than one-dimensional characters, but it moves with such confidence and aplomb you can't help but get sucked into its world on the brink of the cyber awakening.