Doctor Who: The Underwater Menace (TV Soundtrack)

By: Geoffrey Orme

Narrated by: Anneke Wills, Full Cast, Patrick Troughton

The TARDIS materialises on a small volcanic island; on board are the Doctor, Polly, Ben and their new companion Jamie. Exploration of their surroundings reveals a network of caves inside the extinct volcano - and before long all four travellers have been captured by those who live within... This is Earth, and the lost city of Atlantis lies deep underground, its human citizens dependent for food upon a species known as the Fish People. Unfortunately for the Doctor and his friends, the Atlanteans waste little time in offering the new arrivals up as sacrifices to their goddess Amdo! A certain Professor Zaroff has persuaded the Atlanteans that he can raise a city once more above the waves. But the Doctor soon realises that Zaroff's plan is insanely dangerous: the professor's lunatic dreams of ultimate power could lead to the destruction of the entire planet. Can the Doctor and company stop him? Anneke Wills, who also plays Polly, narrates this classic adventure - only two episodes of which survive in the television archives. In a specially recorded bonus interview, she recalls her experiences of making The Underwater Menace in 1967.

"You're Nou Turning ME Into A Fish!!"

For a story of that kind on DOCTOR WHO, it wasn't as bad as others made it out to be. Sure, the sets and some of the acting was campy (Especially from Joseph Hurst. who later hammed it up in the James Bond film, DIAMONDS ARE FORVER). but when listening to the audio restoration by the incomparable Mark Ayres, one can imagine, as did Anneke Wills, aka Polly, who narrates this presentation, what Atlantis could have looked like if the show actually had a budget. The sound, originally from an off-air recording by Graham Strong, who around 17 or so when he recorded this and others by hooking a wire into the telly itself, is excellent! A plus is that it marks Fraser Hines (his second appearance) first story as a companion after originally being introduced as a one-off character in the previous story, "The Highlanders, which is sadly still lost, save for the audio. For me, it was fun to listen to..

good Who!

nice entry in Dr.Who. steady performance by everyone. Polly is strong presence in story. well done. recommend this book to everyone.

The Doctor Discovers Atlantis.

A strange little story. It's also a little goofy. The Doctor and crew discover Atlantis and try to stop one of the most craziest mad scientists to be in a Doctor Who story from destroying the world. It was hard to visualize some of scenes in the audio, because some of it needs to be seen to be believed. I hear when it was televised some of it looked tacky. Maybe it's best we can't see it and we must use are imagination to make it look better. Can hardly wait to listen to the next story.

Get this with the DVD

After the discovery of the missing episode 2 the BBC have finally got around to putting out a DVD release for this story. Unfortunately they have really dropped the ball in their reconstruction of the still missing episodes, and it's nearly impossible to follow the story from just the snapshot reconstruction and soundtrack. I find the best way to experience this story is to play this audio for the missing episodes alongside watching the DVD.

Or you can just forget the DVD and listen to this audio alone, and the pictures in your head will be way better than anything they managed to put on screen in the 60s.