The Underwater Menace animation BFI Southbank world preview

This Big Blue Box writer has felt very lucky recently to be able to attend as many Doctor Who-related screenings as I have. Whilst The Underwater Menace might not have been on top of my list of stories I’d like to see animated following the surprise announcement in August that The Underwater Menace was to be animated I dutifully went along to the world premiere at the British Film Institute in a wet London Southbank on the 21st of October, after storm Babet gave the UK an intense blast.

It’s been just over a year since the last animation “The Abominable Snowmen” was previewed at the BFI. At the time it seemed that the future for animations of missing stories was unclear. So, I never really expected to see another Doctor Who animation so quickly. I’d expected the event to be only the preview screening, but Hosts Justin Johnson (Lead Programmer for BFI) and Dick Fiddy (BFI Archive Television Programmer) were on hand to host the event with their usual bonhomie. The bad weather did affect the attendance as there were a few empty seats.

One guest who was unable to attend but sent a video message was Anneke Wills who played the glamorous 1960’s companion Polly “Duchess” Wright. 

Well, how could we have imagined that our little programme would continue to nourish and inspire and transform so many people’s lives for 60 years…..Pat’s spirit would be delighted that those fish people that he was so anxious about have now become animated forms and will cross the world and reach people’s hearts. I’m so grateful to be a part of it all….”

Anneke Wills

Interview with Mark Ayres (Sound Restoration)

Mark Ayres, composer and sound restorer for the Blu-ray and DVD and BFI regular at these events was interviewed by Dick Fiddy. Asked about his source material for the audio for The Underwater Menace he revealed they were the Graham Strong recordings. These were off-air recordings made by a fan Graham Strong when he was a young fan in the 1960s and gave his original recordings to Mark Ayres for safekeeping before he passed away in 2018. Graham didn’t record the opening and closing titles. Mark explained how he created a master reference episode which everyone used. He remastered the audio and went into some details about why the off-air recordings were better than the optical sound on the 16mm film. The restored live episodes (Episodes 2 & 3) also use the Graham Strong off-air recordings.

Interview Executive Director Anne Marie Walsh, Director Charles Norton and Executive Producer Paul Hembury

Interviewed by Justin Johnson and asked about the creative process, Anne Marie Walsh reiterated that the process of animation isn’t with the aim of completing a frame-by-frame reconstruction of the live episode. Whilst there are two existing episodes the team’s starting point is looking at the camera script.

Due to the fantastical nature of the story, it has allowed for a reimagining of certain aspects. With the background drawn in 2D, the team thought about what was described in the original script.  As an example, Anne Marie explained the temple of Amdo was described in the script as “a massive, cavernous space where Amdo the goddess is a seated figure with big ruby eyes terrifying to behold” so they used their creative medium to draw what the writer intended.

Charles Norton talked about the challenge of using animation, that it cannot replicate the shots used in a live episode. There is a reverence about using the source material of the script but them making it work in animation so disregarding it. It is a new production created in the spirit of the original. What was an interesting fact was the animation version of The Underwater Menace is a 12 certificate not due to anything in the animation but due to the inclusion of a 1960s drama with Patrick Troughton as part of the special features. This led to a discussion regarding showing violence in animation.

The Underwater Menace does show Zaroff shooting Thous and his royal protectors and in the animation, the scene is there albeit without seeing the shots in detail. The soundtrack also guides them as if the sounds are there, they will endeavour to animate in the best way possible but Anne’s Marie role is to consider these types of scenes carefully.

Thinking of the people living below the sea the creative team gave the Atlanteans a blue/ green hue and used the imagery of seashells, and conch shells within the design of the background. There are some memorable sea creatures they also use in the animation in a very Bond villain-type way for Zaroff. He has an octopus as his pet who almost sets the bomb off for him as Zaroff is drowning in the laboratory. There are also some sharks in a large pool.

Interviewed by Justin Johnson Executive Producer Paul Hembury was cautious to disclose they were working on another future animation but diplomatically could not say more at that moment. He wanted to thank his team for their energy in driving the project through and he mentioned some of the challenges of internal restructuring and making a case for animating Doctor Who.

Paul also confirmed that at the time the  BFI (British Film Institute) at London Southbank ran a screening of The Abominable Snowmen they were aware of the commission for The Underwater Menace animation. Paul was asked about the process of choosing which stories to animate and admitted it is a complicated process, looking and the advantages and disadvantages of animating that story, as well as the quality of the audio. They work on one story at a time and financially there has to be a case made to continue doing the animations. The DVD market isn’t increasing but as long as people want to buy the DVDs, they will endeavour to try to make them. The money comes from BBC Studios and there isn’t any Disney Plus money involved. 

My impressions of The Underwater Menace animation

The animation is pretty solid from the team that brought us other stories such as The Evil of the Daleks, The Macra Terror and The Faceless Ones. The drawings do avoid the jerky movements of some of the older animations for the most part and there is an effort to reimagine the look of Atlantis, the fish people with the blue, green palette which doesn’t grate on the eye. Having recently watched the existing live episodes the animation is definitely a good compliment to the live episodes, although never a replacement for Patrick Troughton’s facial expressions which sell every performance. I loved the huge cheer from the audience for the climax of episode three.

Doctor Who: The Underwater Menace is available to preorder now from HMV, Amazon and other retailers. The title will be released on DVD, BluRay and on limited edition steelbook from the 9th November