Re: ChatGPT reviews Doctor Who - The Underwater Menace: comes with good telesnaps, the others are bad

On Mon, 08 Apr 2024 08:23:19 -0700, The Doctor wrote:

"Doctor Who - The Underwater Menace" is a four-part serial from the Fourth
Season of the original series, first broadcast in 1967. The story revolves
around the Doctor and his companions landing on the lost underwater city of
Atlantis, where they encounter a megalomaniacal scientist intent on raising
Atlantis from the depths of the ocean.
>
Episode 1 introduces the intriguing premise of an underwater civilisation,
showcasing impressive set design and atmosphere. However, subsequent episodes
struggle to maintain momentum, with the plot becoming increasingly convoluted
and the pacing uneven.
>
One of the standout elements of "The Underwater Menace" is the memorable
performance of Joseph Furst as Professor Zaroff, the deranged scientist
determined to conquer the world. Furst brings a charismatic yet sinister
presence to the role, elevating the story whenever he appears on screen.
>
Unfortunately, the serial suffers from production limitations, particularly
evident in the underwater sequences, which are hampered by primitive special
effects. Additionally, the characterisation of the Doctor and his companions
feels somewhat underdeveloped, with less focus on their interactions and
dynamics compared to other serials.
>
While "The Underwater Menace" has its flaws, including a somewhat lackluster
resolution, it still offers moments of entertainment and showcases the
creativity of Doctor Who's early years.
>
Episode 1: 6/10
Episode 2: 5/10
Episode 3: 4/10
Episode 4: 5/10
>
Overall Rating: 5/10

What good is this "chatGPT" junk? Stupid "chatGPT" doesn't
even mention that the first and forth chapter is in telesnaps.

The Underwater Menace is the only presentation I've seen with
half-way decent telesnaps.They are nearly free of animation,
if I recall right, they don't zoom in or out, they don't
scroll, they don't have fade ins or fade outs, etc.

It'd help to have some text to help explain what's going
on that's not apparent in the dialog. And it should be
obvious that text shouldn't scroll, especially left to right,
as producers will evidentially do anything they can to make
a program harder to view, so when they hear the word "text"
they immediately think "words are boring, they must be
animated in some way".

The telesnaps in the Web of Fear episode were terrible, panning,
scanning, zooming in and out, even oscillating between
telesnaps during dialog, as if the viewer needs to see a
picture of the Doctor staring at the camera in order to
recognize his voice and words, and showing the telesnaps
out of order.

The telesnaps that came with the American DVDs of Power of
the Daleks (at that time the BBC refused to issue Blu-Rays
to Americans, and I didn't yet get a multi-region player)
had a something called like Small Change presentation of
the complete telesnaps but it was even worse: they allocated
less than a megabyte per second which would have enough
except that Loose Change went and animated the telesnaps!
Steam bubbles up, the telesnaps move and each scene change
has a fade-in and fade-out: every animation of the telesnaps
dissolves into macro-blocks.

The telesnapped Marco Polo is merely an excerpt, not complete,
and suffers from some animation of the telesnaps.

Telesnaps have a bad reputation, and this is due to
producers treating them bad. There's no reason that
the entire collection of black and white Doctor Who
hasn't been released already on home video, using
telesnaps of the unavailable episodes.

The Underwater Menace has half-way decent telesnaps.
Unnecessary animations were done to the titles in
the beginning of the episodes and it was not necessary to
animate the end to eliminate the Tardis from the
picture. The storyline at that point was completely
clear and if the last real telesnap showed the Tardis,
so what?