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Post by Deleted on Jul 26, 2019 8:25:26 GMT
Prompted by a discussion on one of the the Big Finish news threads, which era (on or off television) do you believe - on the whole - had the best cliffhangers and why?
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Post by number13 on Jul 26, 2019 10:51:28 GMT
It's very difficult, because there have been some memorable cliffhangers in most eras, but on the whole I'd go for the Fourth Doctor's era. Too many cliffhangers are 'zoom in on a terrified Companion's face' (and no doubt the Tom years had their fair share!) but imo the best ones are the ones which leave the viewer either shocked or chilled.
Off the top of my head, two shockers and a chiller:
'The Leisure Hive' - the Doctor seems to be torn apart before our eyes... 'The Deadly Assassin' - the Doctor is strangled and apparently drowned. At teatime on BBC1!
But my favourite is the totally non-violent, brilliant cliffhanger from 'Horror of Fang Rock' ep 3 with Tom at his finest: 'Leela, I've made a terrible mistake. I thought I'd locked the enemy out. Instead, I've locked it in - with us.' (Roll credits and shudder!)
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Post by theotherjosh on Jul 26, 2019 11:23:34 GMT
Okay, going to get the obligatory Dragonfire/cliffhanger joke out of the way right at the top here.
When I think of cliffhangers, the one that immediately springs to mind is the levitating Dalek from Remembrance. It's got peril, but it also introduces new information and changes the paradigm, which are traits I think are essential to a good cliffhanger.
I thought Zaltys had a good cliffhanger because (and keeping it general to avoid spoilers), the nature of the baddies is deduced at the end of the episode. You thought circumstances were X, but they're really Y. That's the kind of thing that gets me excited for the next episode. I want to hear what happens next.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 26, 2019 11:39:22 GMT
I can't recall any Doctor Who TV cliffhanger that was as good as the one at the end of the second episode of Dust Breeding!
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Post by theotherjosh on Jul 26, 2019 12:50:49 GMT
I can't recall any Doctor Who TV cliffhanger that was as good as the one at the end of the second episode of Dust Breeding! Not only was that one of the best cliffhangers, but it came exactly at the right moment. I listened to it when I was first getting into Big Finish, and I bought a whole bunch of the inexpensive early main range stories without looking too closely at the descriptions. Right before the cliffhanger, I recall thinking, "This story started out pretty good, but now it's starting to drag." But then it happened, and it was like a bolt of lightning. |
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Post by Hieronymus on Jul 26, 2019 17:28:52 GMT
When I first saw Doctor Who, it was in the movie-edit formats where all the cliffhangers had been removed. One of the few stories I saw in the original episode format was Earthshock (and I had not had any spoilers ahead of time!) The end of each episode was spellbindingly good throughout.
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Post by number13 on Jul 26, 2019 21:45:47 GMT
For BF cliffhangers, my favourite might very well be episode 2 of 'The Black Hole'. {Spoiler}'I've been many things... but when the Doctor first knew me... (impressive pause for effect)... {BIG Spoiler}I was a Monk!' Oh yes!  |
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Post by Hieronymus on Jul 27, 2019 4:09:03 GMT
Well if we're going to include BF cliffhangers, then The Harvest and Solitaire have to be mentioned.
But my favorite BF cliffhanger comes at the end of
{Spoiler}
The Girl Who Never Was
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Post by Deleted on Jul 27, 2019 8:29:13 GMT
When I first saw Doctor Who, it was in the movie-edit formats where all the cliffhangers had been removed. One of the few stories I saw in the original episode format was Earthshock (and I had not had any spoilers ahead of time!) The end of each episode was spellbindingly good throughout. For the movie-edit formats, did you tend to notice when the story hit a cliffhanger moment or were they practically seamless? |
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Post by Hieronymus on Jul 27, 2019 15:05:46 GMT
When I first saw Doctor Who, it was in the movie-edit formats where all the cliffhangers had been removed. One of the few stories I saw in the original episode format was Earthshock (and I had not had any spoilers ahead of time!) The end of each episode was spellbindingly good throughout. For the movie-edit formats, did you tend to notice when the story hit a cliffhanger moment or were they practically seamless? The quality of the join between episodes varied widely. Sometimes it was near-seamless, but other times it was a very poorly executed splice. |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 27, 2019 21:15:02 GMT
Best Doctor Who TV cliffhanger: Planet of the Daleks; the end of Episode One... C'mon, who really saw that coming?!  |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 27, 2019 21:42:34 GMT
From my own memories, the power of the cliffhanger had always been tied into the use of the 'sting' sound effect leading into the theme tune. This seemed more accentuated in sound and with visual emphasis during the Phillip Hinchcliffe years. Certainly there seemed to be a conscious effort to script actual moments of dramatic horror or peril at his time, as opposed to an emphasis in dialogue, as was the case during the Barry Letts era.
The Sixtes era established the cliffhanger in reference to the saturday morning matinee serials such as Flash Gordon (being of similar run time), but without the 'sting' effect.
All eras can compete for great cliffhangers and weak ones such as the check-floor zoom in Death to the Daleks and much of Trial of a Timelord - perhaps a case of the script writer making an effort to structure the story in 25 minute chunks efficiently as opposed to picking the nearest moment of dramatic pause/chapter close.
Thinking of omnibus compilations, it would be interesting to compare how the Paul McGann TVM would fare being split up in to a 3 part story, in the way the Five Doctors was reverse engineered to a four parter repeat. I remember clearly the cliffhanger to part 3 where the Master covertly comes down a few steps as Tegan and Hurndall pass by - que the 'sting'!!
The Dragonfire cliffhanger compares well in comparison...
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Post by number13 on Jul 27, 2019 21:45:30 GMT
When I first saw Doctor Who, it was in the movie-edit formats where all the cliffhangers had been removed. One of the few stories I saw in the original episode format was Earthshock (and I had not had any spoilers ahead of time!) The end of each episode was spellbindingly good throughout. Must have cliffhangers! Back in the 70s, almost the only 'Doctor Who' repeats we ever got were the 'omnibus' versions shown occasionally at Christmas or the summer school holidays. Even then, I missed the cliffhangers, and the early VHS releases in the late 80s carried on in the same less-than-satisfactory style.
Technical dilemma: I used to record Who on audio (video? no way in 70s UK!) and the problem was this: lose the cliffhanger reprises and all but the first and last title music on each side of tape and you could - just - fit a four-parter on a C90 (that's a cassette tape 90 mins long in total, 45 mins per side. For further information, refer to cave paintings and other contemporary sources  ) But include all of each episode and you had to use either a C120 (thinner tape, not such good quality) or two C60s. On pocket-money economics, this was a serious problem. I must admit I used C90s and chopped the cliffhanger reprises, mea culpa. |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 27, 2019 22:09:52 GMT
When I first saw Doctor Who, it was in the movie-edit formats where all the cliffhangers had been removed. One of the few stories I saw in the original episode format was Earthshock (and I had not had any spoilers ahead of time!) The end of each episode was spellbindingly good throughout. Must have cliffhangers! Back in the 70s, almost the only 'Doctor Who' repeats we ever got were the 'omnibus' versions shown occasionally at Christmas or the summer school holidays. Even then, I missed the cliffhangers, and the early VHS releases in the late 80s carried on in the same less-than-satisfactory style.
Technical dilemma: I used to record Who on audio (video? no way in 70s UK!) and the problem was this: lose the cliffhangers, reprises and all but the first and last title music and you could - just - fit a four-parter on a C90 (that's a cassette tape 90 mins long in total, 45 mins per side. For further information, refer to cave paintings and other contemporary sources ) But include all of each episode and you had to use either a C120 (thinner tape, not such good quality) or two C60s. On pocket-money economics, this was a serious problem. I must admit I used C90s and chopped the cliffhangers, mea culpa. I couldnt do that! I tried taping for a short while with the Two Doctors and Timelash (on cheap tapes and an old portable deck) prior to getting a Video Recorder again and it was the Cliffhanger and Peter Howell tune than was the most discernable amidst the dominant 'hiss'.... It was great to actually hear Doctor Who when reading the Targets/DWM back issues despite the dialogue seemingly emanating from the u-bend of the loo! Kids today wouldnt understand, etc..... |
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Post by number13 on Jul 27, 2019 22:20:31 GMT
I couldnt do that! I tried taping for a short while with the Two Doctors and Timelash (on cheap tapes and an old portable deck) prior to getting a Video Recorder again and it was the Cliffhanger and Peter Howell tune than was the most discernable amidst the dominant 'hiss'.... It was great to actually hear Doctor Who when reading the Targets/DWM back issues despite the dialogue seemingly emanating from the u-bend of the loo! Kids today wouldnt understand, etc..... My first audio recording was a good one: 'Pyramids of Mars'! I knew the lines as well as the actors did, I listened so often.
Yes, muffled dialogue but the really tricky part was getting everyone else in the living room to be very, very quiet for 25 mins... |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 27, 2019 23:36:29 GMT
I couldnt do that! I tried taping for a short while with the Two Doctors and Timelash (on cheap tapes and an old portable deck) prior to getting a Video Recorder again and it was the Cliffhanger and Peter Howell tune than was the most discernable amidst the dominant 'hiss'.... It was great to actually hear Doctor Who when reading the Targets/DWM back issues despite the dialogue seemingly emanating from the u-bend of the loo! Kids today wouldnt understand, etc..... My first audio recording was a good one: 'Pyramids of Mars'! I knew the lines as well as the actors did, I listened so often.
Yes, muffled dialogue but the really tricky part was getting everyone else in the living room to be very, very quiet for 25 mins... I bought that one in '86 - about a year after the aforementioned tape recordings, mail order from Sheffield Space Centre, for £25 - about £60 in todays money. All saved from weekly pocket money. So yes, I know it from rote memory too! The poignant thing of the tape recording of The Two Doctors, is the unintentional recording of the pets I had at the time - 'yes my pretty one' prompted a lively reaction from the budgie, for example. In the days before mobile phones and Video cameras recording events, it captures memories that once only photographs used to provide. All locked in forever in an audio tape. Not that I have relistened since the time - I just remember they are still there, tucked away in the storage chest of my old Who collection. Being into something for so long creates a central depository of memories over a long period of ones life, if that does not seem too pretentious, or sentimental. Nothing to do with cliffhangers, but discussing this brings these things back to mind... |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 28, 2019 1:52:02 GMT
My first audio recording was a good one: 'Pyramids of Mars'! I knew the lines as well as the actors did, I listened so often.
Yes, muffled dialogue but the really tricky part was getting everyone else in the living room to be very, very quiet for 25 mins... I bought that one in '86 - about a year after the aforementioned tape recordings, mail order from Sheffield Space Centre, for £25 - about £60 in todays money. All saved from weekly pocket money. So yes, I know it from rote memory too! The poignant thing of the tape recording of The Two Doctors, is the unintentional recording of the pets I had at the time - 'yes my pretty one' prompted a lively reaction from the budgie, for example. In the days before mobile phones and Video cameras recording events, it captures memories that once only photographs used to provide. All locked in forever in an audio tape. Not that I have relistened since the time - I just remember they are still there, tucked away in the storage chest of my old Who collection. Being into something for so long creates a central depository of memories over a long period of ones life, if that does not seem too pretentious, or sentimental. Nothing to do with cliffhangers, but discussing this brings these things back to mind... Nothing wrong with that, it's just as interesting.  A while back I decided to dig up my video player and a few cassettes that had been put into storage, oh, years and years ago now. The first tape I loaded was the second episode of The Keys of Marinus and there was this overwhelming sense of nostalgia. The sound were poorer than the DVD and the noisy "snow" occasionally made the picture unrecognisable, but it carried that same feeling of sitting crosslegged in front of the television when I first saw it. Even cooler was the little tearing veil being lifted between episodes, exposing whatever had been recorded over it first. Those little fingers of snow like an ocean shoreline receding. It's funny the kinds of things that stick with you. Little memories. Like trying desperately to clean the dust from the tape for Vengeance on Varos, so you can find out whether the Doctor survived the Punishment Dome's kill zone or not. The sting is very interesting because it's so synonymous with the show's cliffhangers since 1970/1. It was a great choice to bring it in, but having been brought up on Hartnell stories initially, I'm really fascinated by how much it changed the approach to episode endings. There's still the same power to Sara's "They will be shot on sight! But aim for the head," from Master Plan or Tegana's "And bring the mighty Kublai Khan to his knees," from Marco Polo. It's all dialogue with no incidental music (or much cutting), yet it has the same impact as say... The base going up in The Seeds of Doom. I wonder if it was the way it was written, acted, structured or a combination of all three because it rarely ever fell flat. (The TV Movie actually has two pretty good cliffhangers: the Eighth Doctor's " Who am I?" in the morgue and his revelation to Grace about the effects of the Eye on San Francisco. It's edited perfectly, all you'd really need is to chop in the end credits for each part.) |
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) But include all of each episode and you had to use either a C120 (thinner tape, not such good quality) or two C60s. On pocket-money economics, this was a serious problem. I must admit I used C90s and chopped the cliffhanger reprises, mea culpa.
A while back I decided to dig up my video player and a few cassettes that had been put into storage, oh, years and years ago now. The first tape I loaded was the second episode of The Keys of Marinus and there was this overwhelming sense of nostalgia.