DVD Review--Doctor Who: the Three Doctors

The Three Doctors was a special four-part story that commemorated the tenth anniversary of Doctor Who Broadcast from December 30, 1972-January 20, 1973). It was also the opener for the show's tenth season (Jon Pertwee's fourth as the Doctor). William Hartnell and Patrick Troughton return as the first and second Doctors to assist Doctor Number Three as an oozing blob from an anti-matter universe poses a threat to our own universe.

When the Doctor (Pertwee) is unable to defeat the blob on his own and the Time Lords are powerless to stop the creature, they reunite the Doctor with his two former selves. Due to his failing health, Hartnell was unable to participate in any of the action, so his Doctor is shown on a video monitor with the explanation that he is trapped in a time eddy. The Laurel and Hardy-like exchanges between Troughton and Pertwee are priceless, with Hartnell taking both to task like a schoolteacher scolding a couple of young students.

The central villain in this story is Omega, a Gallifreyan solar engineer long-presumed dead, who helped his people develop the means to travel in time and was believed to have been killed in the process. Omega has survived for centuries in this anti-matter universe, and now wants to return home, which would be catastrophic to our universe.

The DVD bonus features include a commentary track with DW producer Barry Letts along with actors Nicholas Courtney (Brigadier Alastair Lethbridge-Stewart) and Katy Manning (Jo Grant), interviews with Bernard Wilkie and Patrick Troughton conducted in 1972 as well as features from the BBC children's program Blue Peter on Jon Pertwee and the Whomobile as well as a retrospective of the first ten years of Doctor Who. Also included are interviews with Pertwee, Nicholas Courtney, script editor Terrence Dicks and writers Bob Baker and David Martin, as well as the ever-popular "pop-up" production notes.

The Three Doctors is a great celebration of Doctor Who's tenth anniversary, and one of my favorite DW adventures from the Jon Pertwee era.

Some other Doctor Who adventures you might enjoy include:

The Five Doctors (twentieth anniversary story)

The Web Planet (with William Hartnell as the First Doctor)

The Hand of Fear(starring Tom Baker as the Fourth Doctor)

Doctor Who: The Complete First Series (First Season of the new DW series)