Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #21444 in DVD
• Released on: 2007-09-24
• Rating: Parental Guidance
• Formats: Box set, PAL
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 7
• Running time: 634 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
Uniting six complete stories across a full series of Doctor Who in one quest, the Key To Time saga is an ambitious, sometimes too ambitious, piece of television that nonetheless has plenty within it to recommend it.

Starring Tom Baker as Doctor Who he's given a quest by the White Guardian to track down the six constituent parts of the Key to Time. Thus, each of the six stories sees the Doctor and Mary Tamm's Romana hunting down one of the segments.

In many ways showing the highs and the lows of Doctor Who in the late 1970s, the Key To Time has some very distinct highlights. The Pirate Planet, for instance, is a cracking story in its own right (written by Douglas Adams), and we're also fans of The Androids Of Tara and the story that wraps the saga up, The Armageddon Factor. Ironically, it all gets off to a low start with the tepid The Ribos Operation, while The Power Of Kroll is just silly. Even by Doctor Who standards!

Nonetheless, this is a significant and very worthy entry in the Doctor Who canon, with both Tamm and Baker on top form. There's also some cracking episodes within the Key to Time, and a real feeling of risks being taken with a long-running property. --Jon Foster

Synopsis
Taken from the 16th series of the popular science fiction show, this collection includes 'The Ribos Operation', 'The Pirate Planet', 'The Stones Of Blood', 'The Androids Of Tara', The Power Of Kroll' and 'The Armageddon Factor'.

Customer Reviews

The Highlight Of The Graham Williams Era
Creating a story arc as long as this in the 1970's was something which was fairly radical, and Williams should be applauded for being so brave in attempting this with the limited budget he had. Williams is often lambasted by fans, but this is often to scrape over the good times. Most of the terrible episodes were to come in the next series, and what makes this ambitious concept shine is the consistent good quality of the scripts, and the fact that Tom Baker is so obviously enjoying himself, but not to the detriment of his performance as would happen in the next series.

The only reason The Ribos Operation seems to be heavily criticised for me, is that it was written by Robert Holmes, who usually seemed to give so much more. This, for him, is a low key script, but what he manages to do convincingly is create the feeling that you really are in another world subject to another culture. Paul Seed, Ian Cuthbertson and Prentis Hancock all turn in fine performances and their characters are given real depth. Mary Tamm really introduces herself as Romana well.

The Pirate Planet is a very camp space opera, and sometimes features what were Douglas Adams preoccupations in Hitchhiker's Guide. Some of the incedental character's are a little flat, but then standing next to Baker and a scenery eating Bruce Purchase as the Captain most people would. The effects are a little clunky, but given the scope of the story, a lot of budgets would struggle to cope. What makes this story shine is shiningly intelligent and witty dialogue, which is worth sticking with the plot for through the four episodes.

The Stones Of Blood is a hark back to what came before in places, with the gothic horror element mixed in with the sci-fi. David Fisher's first script for the show is a cracker; genuinely chilling in places with some wonderfully moody direction and feeling in the performances.

Fisher follows this with the cracking Androids of Tara, a loose 'homage' to The Prisoner of Zenda, wonderfully shot in a shining summer, again with cracking costumes and concepts relating to the alien culture. This is Baker's second finest comic turn next to City of Death, and opposite a magnificent Peter Jefferies as count Grendel this is a tret to watch.

The Power of Kroll is, simply, terrible. Holmes was writing on autopilot for this. He didn't like the concept of the Key To Time, and having been asked, unwillingly, to set it up, he found himself having to write another. The marshes look good as the alien setting, but everything else just creaks, from the script to the costumes to the set. Not even the presence of John Abiberni or Phillip Madoc can save this. Truly terrible!

The Armageddon Factor suffers from being just too long. The ideas are ambitious from the pen of Baker and Martin, but they just don't quite stretch to fit the format. What makes it worth watching is the interesting use of K-9 as the leading clue, you are actually not quite whose side he is on. There is a wonderful villanous performance from John Woodvine as the mad Marshall, and this is Lalla Ward's impressive debut to the show.

Throw in a box load of extras and you have a great watch on your hands for a couple of hours.

These DVDs are to re-issued
This is a great set but for all you Doctor Who fans that did'nt have the chance to buy this numbered edition box set don't fret as the doctor who restoration team(great site check it out)and 2Entertain have said they will definately be re-releasing them at some point in the near future..Avoid paying silly money for the OOP edition.

What in God's name are you playing at?
Now, I have collected a lot of Doctor Who DVDs, and I haven't got this one yet, because of the price. And I don't care how "brilliant" people say these episodes are, I am not, under any circumstances, paying nearly 2 hundred pounds for a DVD! I can't comment on the episodes themselves, I'm sure they are great, but 200 pounds. PATHETIC!