What's this thing for badly drawn Jon Pertwees on advertising stuff?

Jon Pertwee's face appeared on quite a few products during his tenure as the Doctor.

 Some - like the one on the left - are quite disturbing. 

One wonders what the marketing bods back then thought when they gave the go ahead for this artwork for Kellogg's Sugar Smacks... 

Disturbing.

Pertwee also appeared on a recipe book for the Co-op - everyone's favourite local supermarket. I've not seen a complete copy since the 70s but images of the grinning actor extolling the virtues of good food abound on the internet. 

And, whilst it's a more jovial improvement on the 'bogey man' Sugar Smacks artwork, it's still not exactly a Frank Bellamy Radio Times cover is it?

1974 Doctor Who Comic revealed... at last!

I found this lining the bottom of my granddad's socks and underwear drawer a few weeks before Christmas and have only just gotten round to drying and prizing the pages apart to scan them.

Seems there were plans for a Doctor Who weekly-style comic magazine back in the mid-seventies when Sean's Dad was Dr. Who. 

No idea what happened - though the exciting news on page two will probably give you some idea...

Crossroads novels.... Lots of 'em!

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Malcolm Hulke - the television writer who created the Silurians and the Sea Devils on 'Doctor Who' - was one of the main writers on Crossroads back in the 70s. When his mate Terrance Dicks got the gig to write all those hundreds of novelisations of 'Doctor Who' adventures, he thought he could do the same on 'Crossroads' and badgered the editors at Target Books until they gave in. 

He - and a few friends - managed just over 25 before his typewriter was taken off him. 

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The Lost Tradition of the Christmas TV Annual

A page torn from the 2014/15 Autumn/
Winter Shuttlewoods Catalogue.
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The end of the school holidays in September used to bring with it the sight of Christmas on the horizon - only very tiny but within the space of a couple of months, it would soon loom large.  One of the earliest signs of Christmas in our family was the arrival of the huge tome that was the 'Kays Catalogue'. Hundreds of pages of things to purchase on weekly terms from ladies under apparel to bicycles to three piece suites to socks in packs of five. 

The toy section was always the best. A ready made order form for Santa's shopping list and at the end was usually a whole page of next year's annuals. For the non-UK citizen, an "Annual" is a hardback book usually released in the late summer/early autumn with an air of the Christmas market. Annuals could be based on pop stars, comics, films, cub scouts, kittens or TV shows. I recall checking the relevant pages in my Mum's Kays Catalogue for any new TV annuals. There was always the 'Dr. Who' (qv) annual but nearby listed were usually one or two others the tempt me into including it in the Christmas list - 'The Bionic Woman', 'Logan's Run', 'The Sweeney', 'Battlestar Galactica' and, even to my delight and surprise one year, a 'Blake's 7' one. (I actually managed to get that one BEFORE Christmas. A transgression that according to my father was tantamount to opening presents BEFORE Christmas Day.) 

My eagerness to devour these annual publications was matched by their overall shoddiness and paucity of content. The 'Dr. Who' annuals are legendary for their unique view of the worlds of 'Doctor Who'. Companions who looked nothing like the individuals they were written as, seat belts in the TARDIS and illustrations that looked like the prime ingredient of them was smoked rather than drawn. 

Many of the other annuals were no better though some had their merits. The 'Logan's Run' annual I mentioned earlier featured some early work by the artist David Lloyd who would go on to draw the sublime 'V For Vendetta' and the four 'Dalek' annuals released in the late 70s are almost on a par with their 60s counterparts due no doubt to actually being authored by Terry Nation himself. 


These days, there's still annuals but their content seems to be more based around celebrity than concept. 'Justin Bieber' and the latest boy band fill the flimsy hardbacks with full page paparazi photos and 'fun facts' gleaned from press packs. Even the 'Doctor Who' annual is a vacuous blend of large print, publicity stills, 'fun facts' and word searches - with the odd lightweight comic strip to break the garish monotony. The kids of today might accept this as normal but the plethora of these books that adorn the shelves of charity shops suggest that their appeal is merely ephemeral. I suppose that was the truth back when I devoured them in the 70s. Once Christmas was over and the January sales began in earnest, they were often available for half price or a quid until they died out some time in February. Perhaps that was their function - as a finite piece of fun disguised as a hardback book. 

I liked them though and as is my want as a fifty year old kid, I bemoan their passing. What if the annuals of today had the same obsession with TV they had in the sixties and seventies? 

Seabase Atlantica: The Whole Sorry Story - part three

Since it's production in 1969, Seabase Atlantica has been largely forgotten about. The reasons are a mixture of legal and cultural. The few who saw it in early morning syndication in the US would rather forget about it as would the 'talent' who appeared in it. It's certainly not mentioned on James Darren's otherwise impressive resume.

In recent years, a few have made efforts to rectify this and in the mid-nineties, the magazine 'FanGrok' was the first to a publish a (slightly inaccurate) episode guide. Thanks to Paul Morehouse, we know the reasons for its shady past.

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Today however, I'm pleased to announce that the series will finally get a wider audience. The many political and legal obstacles that have prevented even the publication of images from the show have now been crossed. The complete series will be available on DVD from next month. We've managed to put together on a limited budget a selection of special features to accompany the HD remastered episodes. We even managed to convince some members of the original cast to contribute on the grounds that we will release it away with or without their own defence of their actions. The first 1000 copies of the box set will include a special 'Seabase Atlantica' calendar depicting many unseen photos from the show.

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All-in-all, it looks quite good having seen some of the test discs. I hope to include more details in a future post. 

Andrew-Mark Thompson

SEABASE ATLANTICA

Season two – September-December 1970

REGULAR CAST:

SHELLEY WINTERS…Doctor Hanna Bourbon

JAMES DARREN…Captain Anthony ‘Ziggy’ Shapiro

CHAD MARTIN…Aqua, the Mer-boy

BARBARA EDEN…Susan Crutch

JUDY ALLEN…Cindy Crutch

JONATHAN HARRIS…Voice of Debbie the Robot

2.01

BEYOND THE GREEN SEA

Wr. Stirling Siliphant

Dir. Irwin Allen

Professor Crutch, after a severe mental breakdown, is replaced by kindly matriarch Dr. Hanna Bourbon as commander of Seabase Atlantica. Aqua the Mer-boy discovers a giant starfish and is taken over by it. The starfish dupes him into thinking he’s the ghost of Blackbeard. Dr. Bourbon exorcises the ghostly spirit by placing a peutronic headband on Aqua to disperse the phantom. The radiation from the headband gives the Mer-boy unexpected telepathic powers that prove useful in later episodes.

2.02

MERMAIDS FROM URANUS – part one

Wr. William Welch and Irwin Allen

Dir. Harry Harris

Guest cast: Zsa Zsa Gabor (Mer Queen), Linda Evans, Stella Stevens (Mer Maids).

Green, scaly but beautiful mermaids capture Aqua the Mer-boy, wishing to use him to help them reproduce their race as all men on their home planet have been wiped out by a verminous space plague. Aqua telepathically communicates the location of the Uranian base to Dr. Bourbon, who launches a rocket with her, Ziggy, Susan, Cindy and Debbie the Robot on board to rescue him. But the rocket has to face a meteor storm before it reaches their friend. (Dynasty’s Linda Evans thought she was only contracted to film one episode of this two-parter and was shocked when she discovered it would involve more days filming than she really wanted. The producer was forced to lock her in her Winnebago for the duration of filming to prevent her running off.)

2.03

THE MUSHROOM HUSTLERS

Wr. Peter Packer

Dir. Sobey Martin

Guest cast: David Carradine, Goldie Hawn, Dennis Hopper, Bill Williams Jnr (Hippies).

Susan is turned on by magic undersea mushrooms and become deliriously hallucinogenic. She is rescued from a man-eating crayfish by a tribe of gentle underwater hippies, desperate for new supplies of the wonder fungus. Ziggy rescues Susan and entombs the hippies forever at the bottom of the sea.

(The giant mushroom prop actually heralds from the original 1939 MGM production of ‘The Wizard of Oz’.)

2.04

BATTLE OF THE WEREWOLVES

Wr. William Welch

Dir. Sober Martini

Guest cast: Bill Williams Jnr, Rick Springfield (Werewolves).

Ziggy is infected by a virulent peutronic virus that turns him into a werewolf. He goes berserk and releases another werewolf, being transported to the base, from its cage. They go on a killing rampage and, as more and more people becoming infected, the werewolves threaten to take over. It’s a race against time as Dr. Bourbon and Susan struggle to find an antidote before the entire world is taken over.

2.05

MERMAIDS FROM URANUS – part two

Wr. William Welch and Irwin Allen

Dir. Harry Harris

Guest cast: Zsa Zsa Gabor (Mer Queen), Linda Evans, Stella Stevens, Bill Williams Jnr (Mer Maids), Eddie Boyle (Dog).

The rocket lands on Venus but Aqua is now under the thrall of the sexy Mer Queen. Dr. Bourbon is tortured and forced into the pit of mud to wrestle to the death with the Mer Queen whilst Ziggy and Susan are rescuing Aqua. The family return to Earth after the Mermaids’ power source is sucked out.

2.06

THE BIG BEAST

Wr. Jack Turley

Dir. Harry Harris

A giant purple cloud approaches the Earth and releases yellow and pink spores in the oceans, from which an evil turquoise and vermilion seaweed parasite emerges. Hanna must lure the creature into an extinct volcano, where Debbie the Robot is waiting to ignite a peutronic incendiary device. The volcano erupts bathing the parasite in hot lava and burning it to death. (Footage of the volcano erupting was taken from an NBC news report that one of the show's technicians had taped the night before shooting started.)

2.07

THE RETURN OF THE MARY CELESTE

Wr. Wanda Duncan and Bob

Dir. Sobey Martin

Guest cast: Henry Jones (Prof Sphere), Bill Williams Jnr (Sailor man).

Ziggy discovers the body of a man wearing an old fashioned sailor’s uniform and, in turn, stumbles across an ancient undersea civilisation peopled by the crews of vanished sailing ships. They are ruled over by the megalomaniac Professor Sphere, who plans to destroy the world with a giant atom crusher that will release super-heated plankton into the Earth’s core and split it open. He gets drowned when his security kitchen is flooded.

2.08

THE DOUBLE ANENOMIES

Wr. William Welch

Dir. Harry Harris

While swimming near the base, Cindy is swallowed by a giant sea anemone, which duplicates her form and sends it back to Seabase. The duplicate plans to turn the peutronic reactor on to over and infect the base with deadly radiation, in turn converting everyone into dangerous zombie werewolves. Just in time, Aqua finds the real Cindy’s body. He returns with her to help Ziggy grapple with the duplicate and toss it into a seaweed threshing machine. (This is another of Judy Allen's least favourite best remembered episodes according to one of her carers.)

2.09

THE RED VAMPIRE DEVILS

WR. Bob and Esther Mitchell

Director Harry Harris

Guest cast: Peter Mark Richman (Gonadski), Lloyd Bochner (Swasslehoffmann), Bill Williams Jnr (First and second vampire man).

Evil red agents kidnap Hanna and Susan and are then attacked and killed by two blood sucking vampire creatures. But with the two women now buried alive in an undersea grotto with less than an hour’s worth of air, it’s a race against time for Aqua the Mer-boy to telepathically locate them without himself becoming trapped and sucked to death by the savage vampire devils that guard the cave system. (The Russian embassy in Washington complained about the portrayal of their citizens as blood lusting vampires. A letter appeared in Pravda a month after the episode's transmission, denying that it was based on fact.)

2.10

DESTROY SEABASE!

Wr. Dan Ullman

Dir. Harry Harris

Guest cast: Jonathan Harris (Dr. Crutch), Bill Williams Jnr (Midget fire eater).

An underwater circus visits the Seabase but unknown to the denizens of Atlantica, the lead clown and ringmaster is, in truth, the insane Dr. Crutch, who has escaped from his top secret, high security lunatic asylum and plans to blow up the base. Luckily, Debbie the robot recognises her former master’s voice and electro-zaps him.

2.11

MURDER IS AN UNDERWATER NIGHTMARE OF REVENGE

Wr. Bruce Geller and Irwin Allen

Dir. Sutton Roley

Guest cast: Mike Connors (TV’s Joe Mannix), Kent Smith (The Murderer), Bill Williams Jnr (The other suspect).

When a visiting scientist is murdered on the Seabase, Dr Bourbon is forced to bring in outside help in the form of TV’s Joe Mannix. The private detective is forced to use all of his wits to identify the murderer before he strikes again spelling doom for the base and its crew. (Mike Connors agreed to appearing in this episode as a forfeit for losing a round of golf with Shelley Winters.)

2.12

THE UNSEEABLE MENACE

Wr. William Welch

Dir. Ronald Neame

Seabase Atlantica is infiltrated by mysterious sewer dwelling entities which attack and devour people in bathrooms. Ziggy and Aqua the Mer-boy are miniaturised and sent down the plumbing in a two-man sub. They destroy the creatures with special anti-septic grenades. (This episode utilised the sub from the movie 'Fantastic Voyage' after the director discovered it on the 20^th Century Fox lot under a tarpaulin. Sadly the prop was not in the best of condition and the show's budget did not allow any restorative work to be carried out on it. Look closely in the second act and you can see the phrase 'What's jammin kid?' graffitoed just by the escape hatch handle.)

2.13

STAR OF BEDLAM

Wr. Irwin Allen

Dir. Sobey Martin

Guest cast: Bill Williams Jnr (Evil tree).

In this special Christmas episode, Dr Bourbon, Ziggy and Aqua the Mer-boy journey to investigate a strange light that falls into the sea. They find what appears to be a Christmas tree sent from the stars. Returning with it to the base, they are horrified to discover that it is really a deadly space conifer that has been sent to pave the way for an all-out invasion of planet Earth. The tree paralyses Dr Bourbon and Ziggy with stinging needles but just in time, Aqua telepathically convinces it that it is an ordinary Christmas tree and is a worldwide symbol of peace and goodwill. With the conifer frozen, Dr Bourbon is able to destroy it forever with a powerful defoliant and Christmas is saved.

2.14

TOAD HELL

Wr. William Welch

Dir. Harry Harris

Guest cast: Warren Stevens (Dr. Gammynekker), Bill Williams Jnr (Toad tongue operator).

The crew of the Seabase find themselves lost in the Mojha desert under threat from the giant toads of Dr. Gammynekker. The evil doctor plans to use his toads to threaten the UN with annihilation but Dr. Bourbon is able to stop him and he is devoured by one of his toad minions during a freak electrical storm caused by his peutron ray bomb.

9/8/2014 STOP PRESS: The DVD release of 'Seabase Atlantica' has been postponed due to unforseen legal issues with the estate of Irwin Allen.

Seabase Atlantica: The Whole Story

Written by Andrew-Mark Thompson

Based on material originally written and researched by Paul Morehouse and first published in the magazine ‘FanGrok’

With humble acknowledgement to the work of Adam Richards and Owen Richards.

Seabase Atlantica: The Whole Sorry Story - part one

Introduction

I was first introduced to the bizarre-ness that is (or rather was) Seabase Atlantica by an American friend called Paul Morehouse back in the mid-nineties. It was the dawn of the internet age and Paul lived just outside Philadelphia in the US. I’ve since lost touch with him. A friend of a friend told me he got married and moved to Canada whilst someone I met a few years ago told me, he had died from a septic paper cut. Whatever his fate, I have him to thank for this little effort. His was the original research and most of the words within the episode synopses are his. All I have done is to embellish the facts with fresh ones that I have uncovered in the two decades since our first efforts.

What is ‘Seabase Atlantica’?

In short, it was a TV science fiction adventure series made in the late sixties/early seventies (accounts differ with dates) by the later Master of cinema disaster, Irwin Allen. Irwin at the time had made a name for himself in television with success with the likes of ‘Lost in Space’ and ‘Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea’ – both of which were known in equal measures for both their incredible special effects and their increasingly bizarre storylines.

‘Seabase Atlantica’ built on all this… or at least, it is reputed to have. The thing is, nobody actually remembers it and very few have actually seen it.

Irwin Allen’s ‘Devon Productions’ made the series for Twentieth Century Fox at a time when the studio was in a dire financial situation. A lot of money was ploughed into ‘Seabase Atlantica’ as a production but the show saw very little return. The reasons are subject to conjecture but the most enduring one suggests that it was made without a sale to a major network such as ABC or CBS. It was assumed that one of them would buy the finished product but instead, all of them turned their noses up at it. At the last minute, some quick thinking saw the first season air on a handful of local syndicated stations and there are reports that it was sighted in Norway in 1972 or possibly it was Sweden in 1973 – we just don’t know! 

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One of the most tangible sightings was in the UK where early copies of a 1969 edition of the ‘Radio Times’ heralded its forthcoming debut on BBC1 but most archive copies from the period seem to suggest these early editions were withdrawn and reprinted with alternative programming for the show’s alleged Saturday night slot.

Fate would deal ‘Seabase Atlantica’ a further blow in 1971 – a blow that would involve the US government and seal the show’s future in a permanent limbo. Part two will follow shortly.

SEABASE ATLANTICA - 
season one 
episode guide - part one

September 1969 - March 1970

REGULAR CAST:

ROBERT YOUNG…Professor Jonathan Crutch

JAMES DARREN…Captain Anthony ‘Ziggy’ Shapiro

CHAD MARTIN…Aqua, the Mer-boy

BARBARA EDEN…Susan Crutch

JUDY ALLEN…Cindy Crutch

JONATHAN HARRIS…Voice of Debbie the Robot

1.01

INVASION OF THE WEREWOLF ROBOT

Wr. William Welch (from a story by Irwin Allen)

Dir. Felix Feist

Prof Jon Crutch is putting the finishing touches to his new invention – the hyper-intelligent robotoid his daughter has christened ‘Debbie’. Suddenly, a power surge causes it to go out of control and to raid the sea base’s peutronic reactor. Affected by the radiation, the robot is transformed into a werewolf and kidnaps little Cindy Crutch. Ziggy follows them to a cavern beneath the ocean floor where he is able to activate some radiation dampening plankton and cure the robot’s lycanthropy. Debbie is later repaired and becomes the latest member of the Crutch family.

1.02

THE RETURN OF KING PRAWN

Wr. Arthur Weiss (from a story by Harlan Ellison)

Dir. Robert Spar

Guest cast: Tim O’Connor (The Prawn).

A giant intelligent prawn man invades the aqua-base, claiming that the Crutch family are destroying the seabed with their latest experiments with nuclear fission. He hypnotises Aqua and commands him to put the peutronic pile on overload. However, the super-prawn is overcome by the radiation and faints.

(Tim O’Connor had just finished filming an episode of ‘Mannix’ when he got the call to the Seabase Atlantica set. Despite his and his agent’s effort, he was unable to get out of his contract for the role.)

1.03

WISH UPON A CRAB

Wr. Bob and Esther Mitchell

Dir. Sobey Martin

Guest Cast: Carroll O’Connor (Voice of Crab)

A Red spy satellite crashes in the sea near the base and begins leaking deadly radioactive isotopes into the sea. Cindy pet spider crab finds the wrecked satellite and, affected by the radiation, it grows to enormous proportions and threatens the base. With Prof. Crutch’s help, Cindy is able to communicate telepathically with the crab and tormented by what it has done, it explodes.

(Richard Basehart was originally cast as the crab’s voice but was overdubbed in post because the director wanted a more friendly sounding crab.)

1.04

GHOST OF THE AIRWAYS

Wr. Shimon Wincelberg and Steven Bochco

Dir. James Goldstone

Guest cast: Florence Henderson (The Ghost of Amelia Earhart).

Jon Crutch discovers the wreckage of Amelia Earhart’s plane and takes it back for study to Seabase Atlantica. There, the poltergeist spirit of Miss Earhart reeks havoc and eventually takes over the body of Susan Crutch. Ziggy manages to render her unconscious and places her in a lead-lined anti-gravity chamber. Switching on the decompression oscillator, he is able to exorcise the spirit and destroy the phantom aviator forever.

1.05

BRAIN EATERS FROM DEEP SPACE

Wr. William Welch

Dir. Felix Feist

Guest cast: Ernest Borgnine (King Anthrax), Bill Williams Jnr (The Arbitron).

The Crutch family accidentally discover the lost kingdom of Atlantis and its king – Anthrax – falls in love with Susan. If the others are to ever leave the city, Susan must stay behind and marry the monarch. The only way to escape is for Ziggy to battle the Arbitron – a giant two-legged sea urchin – and claim Susan for his own.

1.06

PRISONERS OF THE SPACE MENAGERIE

Wr. Richard Shapiro

Dir. Sobey Martin

Guest Cast: Basil Rathbone (Keeper), Bill Williams Jnr (Rubber Pluroid Man, Green Gorilla Creature, Giant Lizard Monster, Zoldax the Barren)

Giant men from the centre of the sun imprison Ziggy and Susan in their space zoo on the planet Mercury. Jon is forced to bargain with the aliens using the sea base’s peutronium rods – a power source that they desperately desire.

(Some sources suggest that the filming of this episode led to guest star Basil Rathbone’s shingles during his final years.)

1.07

THE COSMIC ELIMINATORS

Wr. Bob and Esther Rantzen

Dir. Harry Harris

Guest cast: Ricardo Montalban (Golden Alien Man), Bill Williams Jnr (Semun).

A golden alien man arrives at Seabase Atlantica to place Jon Crutch on trial for his continued bastardising of the Earth’s resources. Cindy is forced to use a telepathic memorathon to call up incidents from her father’s past to plead his innocence. The alien decides to finally grant Crutch his freedom when he sees a single tear in the child’s eye. (This story features footage from the unseen pilot ‘God Thing With Nine Brains” and previous episodes. It was hastily made when star Robert Young turned up drunk and dyed green on set one morning following a stag do for actor James Brolin.)

1.08

PREHISTORIC PERIL

Wr. Arthur Weiss and Irwin Allen

Dir. Irwin Allen

A massive explosion in the seabase’s peutron store catapults the Crutch family back to prehistorical times where they battle stock footage from Irwin Allen’s movie ‘The Lost World’. As the local volcano threatens to devour them all, Cindy wakes up. It was all a dream.

(Another episode hastily put together to allow star Robert Young to recover further.)

1.09

THE DAY OF THE ATOM MEN

Wr. William Welch

Dir. Harry Harris

Guest cast: David McCallum (Horrkostovich), Bill Williams Jnr (First Spy), Ian Wood (Third Spy), Gerry O’Dell (Fourth Spy), Simon Greenfield (Spy).

Evil red scientists infiltrate the seabase and its peutron rods. However, they become infected by their atom radiation and turn into werewolves. The added radiation count reanimates Cindy’s dead pet crab, which kills the atom-wolves in a massive nucleonic explosion. (This episode re-used footage from ‘Wish Upon a Crab’)

1.10

THE DOOMSDAY MUSIC

Wr. Bob and Wanda Ventham

Dir. Nathan Juran

Guest cast: The Kelp Drifters (Themselves), Don Knotts (T.P.Flexiton), Bill Williams Jnr (Gorilla).

A visiting pop band are unaware that their manager, Mr. Flexiton, is really a foreign agent who plans to use the group’s music to enslave and control the world’s youth population. Aqua the Mer-boy is mysteriously unaffected and smothers the group’s amplifiers with liquid seaweed before their live broadcast from Atlantica can take place. Mr. Flexiton is beaten to death by a gorilla. (The song featured in this episode, ‘I Wanna Kiss Your Octopus’, was released as a single by The Kelp Drifters and got to number sixty-eight for one week in the Billboard Top 100 until someone noticed.)

1.11

THE SPACE CANNIBALS

Wr. William Welch

Dir. Harry Harris

Guest cast: Ronnie Reagan (Voice of Dossar), Bill Williams Jnr (Fungoid Man).

A giant fungoid man from space arrives at the base. Its plan is to kidnap humans as food for its master, Dossar – an energy being from the planet Mercurion. Crutch lures him to the base’s main control centre where Debbie the Robot short-circuits him. (Actor Ronnie Reagan had originally requested no on-screen credit for his role but this was declined as the graphics department had already ordered the letraset.)

1.12

SCRIPT OF DOOM

Wr. Sidney Marshall

Dir. Sobey Martin

Guest cast: Vincent Price (Phutt), Bill Williams Jnr (Mummy man).

The Crutch family discover an ancient scroll at the bottom of the sea, little realising that once its hieroglyphs are translated, it will summon the Egyptian god, Phutt, who plans to snuff out all life on Earth. He doesn’t though because of something. (Vincent Price auctioned off the dentures he used in this episode in the 1980s to raise money for saving babies. They fetched $35 before tax)

1.13

FIRE AT THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA

Wr. Charles Bennett (from a story by Irwin Allen)

Dir. Harry Harris

A long dead volcano erupts and threatens to engulf the seabase. Jon and Ziggy journey to cap the crater with a peutron plug, little realising that little Cindy is trapped in a cave beneath the raging inferno. It’s up to Aqua the Mer-boy to rescue her before the area is showered with deadly peutronic particles.

(Some of the background plates of the volcanic fire were re-used by Allen in the movie ‘The Towering Inferno’)

Continued in part two here

Seabase Atlantica: The Whole Sorry Story

Written by Andrew-Mark Thompson

Based on material originally written and researched by Paul Morehouse and first published in the magazine ‘FanGrok’

With humble acknowledgement to the work of Adam Richards and Owen Richards.

Great Unreleased Doctor Who Merchandise of the 20th Century - part six

ORIGINAL DR. WHO EPISODES ON U-MATIC TAPE

Released by BBC Enterprises - 1972 - Original price £249 per episode

The U-matic tape format was invented in 1969 and was released onto the commercial market two years later. Seeing the potential for making its programmes available to the domestic market, the BBC decided to invest in a series of selected U-matic Home Video releases for 1972. 

It's safe to say that the BBC were nearly a decade too early and they'd got the format wrong – something they would repeat many years later with MP3 CDs and DVDAudio discs. 

They also assumed that since the public was potentially willing to pay upwards of several thousand pounds for a U-matic playback/recorder, they would also be able to afford to pay several hundreds of pounds for original television programmes. In the end, they couldn't even afford the machine let alone the tapes.  

I have one of these videos in my possession but since it has no cover or label and I do not own a U-matic playback machine, I cannot verify the contents. So there. 

Great Unreleased Doctor Who Merchandise of the 20th Century - part four

THE MASTER ANNUAL 1975

Published by World Distributors Ltd - 1974 - Original price 95p

A year or so before the release of their 'Dalek' annuals, World Distributors Ltd looked to other parts of the 'Doctor Who' to exploit. Some bright spark came up with 'The Master Annual'. This test copy features all the usual picture strips, zany art and bewildering features one would expect. The stories include such luridly titled efforts as 'Terror on Alpha One', 'The Golden Death', 'Invasion of the Puff Creatures' and 'Killer from the Asteroid Belt'. The features have a bent towards villainy rather than space (like the previous annuals based on the parent series). There's an A-Z of Villainy which includes topics such as 'blackmail', 'Lizzie Borden', 'arsenic' and 'the Conservative Party' together with a game which gives the players a chance to kill the Doctor by trapping him in a pit of “Perluvian acid snakes”. 

As is usual, the is no credit for writers or artists and the copyright is simply credited to the BBC. Documentation from the original publishers suggests a print run of 5,000 was supplied to them from a printing house in Spain though there is no record of either their storage or destruction in the UK. 

Great Unreleased Doctor Who Merchandise of the 20th Century - part three

UNIT COMIC

Nearly published by Polystyle Publications - 1971 - Original price: 5p

The first issue of 'Countdown' comic was a huge success. Kids loved the mix of serious sci-fi comic strips featuring their favourite TV heroes from old favourites like Dr. Who to that new kid on the block, Gerry Anderson's UFO. This success led to the producers hastily putting to together a sister publication. UNIT would be more action-based with an emphasis shifting from just sci-fi to other telly hits of the time. The lead strip featured a spin-off from 'Doctor Who' in the form of 'UNIT' which saw the Brigadier aided by agents Jo Grant, Mike Yates and Benson battle Earth-based threat with no mention of their time travelling mentor, the Doctor. The likenesses to the TV characters in the first instalment were okay, with artwork up to the sister comic's standard. - However, keen eyes would notice that "Benson" bore little resemblance to the actor who played the TV character "Benton". Official BBC paperwork from the period suggests that a certain actor refused to allow his likeness to be used for the £1.55 per issue fee. Thus another character was created to replace him at no cost whatsoever. And "Benson" was born...

In the end, sales of 'Countdown' fell dramatically. The idea for 'UNIT Comic' swiftly ended and 'Countdown' went on to become 'TV Action' before suffering a slow death when it merged with TV Comic a year or so later.  

All that is left - aside from a cover - is a mock-up comic strip with Sgt. Benton's face scribbled out forcefully with a deep red marker pen.