Season Review

On reflection, season 17 is actually fairly mediocre. The season kicks of with a promising start with Destiny of the Daleks, but the story has some issues in terms of budget, replacement actors and having the 'evil' taken out of the Daleks.

Things pick up with the classic City of Death, before the season takes a complete nose dive with the next three stories. The Creature from The Pit is just terrible and that's not just because of the urm... monster. Then we get Nightmare of Eden which, whilst good in concept, is poorly executed. Finally, The Horns of Nimon caps the season with another complete dud. Had the season originally ended with Shada, it would have ended on a high note, however, as Shada never aired due to industrial action, season 17, as originally aired, only contains one decent story and one reasonable story.

The Collection Review

The Collection Box Set Releases: Season 17 is the tenth The Collection boxset to be released. This season is the fourth Tom Baker season released in The Collection after Seasons 12, 18 and 14.

The boxset contains 7 disks. There are five serials included. The sixth abandoned, un-transmitted story, Shada, is included together with a bonus Shada disk.The first Shada disk is 'The Definitive Version' and represents what the serial would have looked like in an original transmission format. Animation fills in the scenes that were not filmed. The transition between the live and animated scenes feels wonderfully seamless. The music by Mark Ayre replaces the music on the original VHS version of Shada and is better for it.

The cover of the boxset has Tom Baker new atire for the season against a backdrop from City of Death.

Inner Booklet Cover Holder: From The Horns of Nimon.

Booklet Cover: From Destiny of The Daleks.

Console Room: From Destiny of The Daleks.

Blu-ray Disk Narration: Tom Baker

Special Features

In addition to Shada, Destiny of the Daleks gets an update with new special effects and enhanced 5.1 Surround sound  definitely worth opting for when viewing.

Creature from the Pit also gets an SFX update, but unfortunately this doesn't help the story...