My rewatch of the 1st Doctor era continues. Here’s what I watched (and listened to!) this week

Edge of Destruction 
It’s fine. It’s really ambitious to have a more psychological story this early on but even at the story only being 2 episodes it feels a little long. Plus the odd character behavior is never really explained that well. Still, from what I recall it’s kinda the only Tardis only story from the original series? Or at least one of the very few?

Marco Polo
Obviously watched the reconstruction since all the episodes are missing. I know this is supposed to be a hidden gem but oof, couldn’t get past the yellow face for some of the characters. It would only be worse if we had the actual footage.It’s fascinating that the Doctor really isn’t in this one much and even William Russell seemed to be annoyed by this from reading about the production. It’s also wild that this story takes place over months instead of just a few days like most Doctor Who stories.

Really impressed with the reconstruction quality though, including having the actor who played Marco Polo doing an intro for the story as an older version of the character. Marco Polo is a jerk.

I guess I would recommend the novelization though? The story itself is fine.

Doctor Who: The Companion Chronicles – Quinnis
My first Big Finish story as part of the rewatch! I’ve listened to a lot of them before but as part of my rewatch I’m trying to listen to any along the way that would slot in nicely with where I’m at in the rewatch. So I picked Quinnis, a story in their Companion Chronicles line which is sorta in-between an audio book and radio drama. It’s narrated by the actress who played Susan so she acts her lines out and there’s also special effects, but narrates other parts. I thought it would make sense to listen to a prequel set before the series starts but it’s being told after Doctors 1-8 and references stuff at the beginning of the story that came up during with the 8th Doctor’s era like Susan’s son so I guess I goofed on this one. Ah well.

The production is nice and it’s a decent story. It also does a good job of staying true to that version of the Doctor and Susan. It’s not a groundbreaking story but a fun enough one off and has better pacing than a lot of 1st Doctor stories. I just wish it wasn’t referencing other Big Finish stuff. There’s probably other 1st doctor audio stories I would recommend over this, there’s some I’m really looking forward to listening to in my library, but it’s a fun story and pretty cheap too so why not. Only an hour long too.