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CLASSIC DOCTOR WHO: Planet of Giants / DVD Review
It was Cecil Edwin Webber who first came up with the idea of miniaturising the Doctor and his companions as a potential story idea. 'Bunny' Webber (will we ever find out why his friends called him...
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CLASSIC DOCTOR WHO: Vengeance on Varos / Special Edition DVD Review
In the late 1960s and early 1970s Philip Martin, the writer of Vengeance on Varos, had plied his trade on Z Cars (1962-78) initially as an actor and then made the transition to writing for the series...
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DOCTOR WHO: Series 7 - Asylum of the Daleks / Review (SPOILERS)
Asylum of the DaleksBBC One HD1st September 2012, 7.20pm The review contains plot spoilers.33 years to the day that Terry Nation's Destiny of the Daleks trundled its way onto our screens to open...
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DOCTOR WHO: Series 7 - Dinosaurs on a Spaceship / Review (SPOILERS)
Dinosaurs on a SpaceshipBBC One HD8th September 2012, 7.35pm The review contains plot spoilers.The Doctor and the dinosaurs. It seems you can't have one without the other. If they're not jumping up...
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GHOST STORIES: Lost Hearts, The Treasure of Abbot Thomas & The Ash Tree / DVD...
Lawrence Gordon Clark's next venture into adapting M.R. James, Lost Hearts (tx: 25/12/73), saw a number of changes in production. The BBC's drama department, noting the success of the 'Ghost Stories...
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DOCTOR WHO: Series 7 - A Town Called Mercy / Review (SPOILERS)
A Town Called MercyBBC One HD15th September 2012, 7.35pm The review contains plot spoilers.Doctor Who and the western genre are not the easiest of companions. Donald Cotton's sorely underrated...
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GHOST STORIES: The Signalman, Stigma & The Ice House / DVD Review
Lawrence Gordon Clark and Rosemary Hill had planned another adaptation for the BBC, of M.R. James' Number 13, in 1976 but found it difficult to translate the story and its Scandinavian setting to the...
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DOCTOR WHO: Series 7 - The Power of Three / Review (SPOILERS)
The Power of ThreeBBC One HD22nd September 2012, 7.30pm The review contains plot spoilers.The female narrator has taken pride of place in the opening of many Doctor Who episodes since 2005,...
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CLASSIC DOCTOR WHO: The Ambassadors of Death / DVD Review
On the strength of his script for The Enemy of the World, former series story-editor David Whitaker was commissioned by Derrick Sherwin, the incumbent script-editor of Doctor Who in 1968, to develop a...
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COMPETITION: Hell is a City / DVD Giveaway
Hammer's celebrated film noir Hell is a City (1960) is heading to DVD on 8 October and Cathode Ray Tube has two copies, courtesy of StudioCanal to giveaway in its latest competition.It was filmed,...
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DOCTOR WHO: Series 7 - The Angels Take Manhattan / Review (SPOILERS)
The Angels Take ManhattanBBC HD29 September 2012, 7.20pmThe review contains plot spoilers.'New York. The city of a million stories. Half of them are true, the other half haven't happened yet,' drawls...
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BRITISH CULT CLASSICS: The Curse of Frankenstein / 3-Disc Double Play Blu-Ray...
'I should rank The Curse of Frankenstein among the half-dozen most repulsive films I have encountered in the course of some 10,000 miles of film reviewing.' That was C.J. Lajeune's humble, if not...
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COMPETITION: Doctor Who books up for grabs!
Missing your Doctor Who fix now that the current series has finished and the Ponds have departed?Not to worry, Cathode Ray Tube has two Doctor Who books looking for a Time Lord-loving owner. Our latest...
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BRITISH CULT CLASSICS: The Devil Rides Out / Blu-Ray Review
Hammer's eventual involvement in The Devil Rides Out was the outcome of two serendipitous attempts to gain the rights to Dennis Wheatley's original novel, written in 1934. Michael Stainer-Hutchins and...
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BRITISH CULT CLASSICS: Rasputin the Mad Monk / Blu-Ray Review
It was apparently actor George Woodbridge who suggested the idea of filming Prince Felix Yusupov's memoir Lost Splendour to Hammer producer Anthony Hinds in 1961. However, it wasn't until Christopher...
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COMPETITION: Doctor Who and Torchwood books up for grabs!
Two book competitions! Yes, one competition for those Who fans out there! A chance to win Stephen Baxter's The Wheel of Ice featuring the Second Doctor. And for anyone yearning for more Torchwood,...
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BRITISH CULT CLASSICS: The Mummy's Shroud / Blu-Ray Review
The Mummy's Shroud was the last film Hammer made at Bray Studios and it therefore marked the end of a particular era for the company. Producers Anthony Hinds and Anthony Nelson Keys had attempted to...
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CLASSIC DOCTOR WHO: The Claws of Axos / Special Edition DVD Review
The Claws of Axos was certainly a long time gestating under the auspices of 'the Bristol Boys', Bob Baker and Dave Martin and they came to write for Doctor Who by a slightly unusual route.Bob, a...
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BRITISH CULT CLASSICS: It Always Rains on Sunday / Blu-Ray Review
The re-release of Robert Hamer's It Always Rains on Sunday is very welcome indeed. StudioCanal and the BFI have lavished some attention on the film, remastering and repairing from two nitrate fine...
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REMEMBERING TENKO: A Celebration of the Classic TV Drama Series / Book Review
Andy Priestner, whose superb book on Secret Army sent many of us racing back to the DVDs to watch the series all over again, now turns his attention to BBC's Tenko (1981-85) in a lavish and...
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