EDIT: This project is currently dead. One day I may pick it up again, but all work would have to be redone from scratch, so I wouldn’t hold your breath. Sorry to anyone who was looking forward to this.
Well, the title describes this pretty well. Using my (still not 100% completed) NTSC conversion as a base, I’m going to recut the 1996 Doctor Who TV movie to be more of a bridge from the classic to current series and less of a weird … thing of its own.
List of changes that I can remember, so far:
- New opening credits and title (The Enemy Within)
- “New” theme music taken from the Big Finish Eighth Doctor audio dramas
- Split into two ~30 minute parts
- Part One opens with Lee running from the gangsters/finding the TARDIS
- Various trims to this sequence (for instance, we don’t see the bullets hit the Doctor’s shoulder - though it might actually look a little more brutal the way I’ve cut it, so I might go back and change it)
- Trims to the ambulance sequence (“I’m not signing anything, buddy!” is gone)
- No cutting back-and-forth between the Doctor getting wheeled into the hospital and the snake-Master in the ambulance - we see the Doctor get wheeled in and X-rayed, then we see the Master slide up into Bruce’s jacket, then we go back to the Doctor being worked on by the nurse/doctor
- The surgery scene has several trims - the Doctor never sits up, and all he says before he’s knocked out by the gas is “I’m not one of you, I’m not human” (or something like that) - no “Timing malfunction - the Master!” and no sitting up and screaming right before he dies
- Trims to Bruce’s possession to make it less gruesome; we also don’t see him choke his wife
Part One ends with the Master arriving at Grace’s house to pick up the Doctor - the ending leads you to believe that the Doctor recognizes the Master. Part Two reveals that he doesn’t recognize him.
As a teaser, here’s the opening credits as I have them now. Note that I chose Futura due to its use in both the classic series and the current series from 2005-2009 (don’t know what they use now, though it could just be an enlongated version of Futura).
I’ve also used the Big Finish Productions’ Eighth Doctor theme, taken from Storm Warning and Invaders from Mars (much cleaner break for the ending) in particular, instead of the theme used in the film. This helps to tie the TV movie to the audio dramas, as well, which I think is a good thing.
I’m open to suggestions, of course!
Without further ado, the first glimpse at this edit - the new opening credits sequence for Doctor Who: The Enemy Within: