THE SEA DEVILS was a follow-up story to two DOCTOR WHO stories- THE SILURIANS and THE DAEMONS. The Doctor (Jon Pertwee) and Jo Grant (Katy Manning) investigate the disappearance of three ships at sea after visiting The Master (Roger Delgado)at his prison. Soon The Doctor finds a different species of Silurians have been awakened and The Master is trying to ally himself with them. The Doctor wants to make peace with the Silurians aka Sea Devils, but his efforts may be for nothing as The Master and the British government have their own plans for the Sea Devils. The Sea Devils like their Silurian cousins want to eliminate the human race.

THE SEA DEVILS is an excellent story from scribe Malcolm Hulke (who also wrote DOCTOR WHO AND THE SILURIANS). This story presented the production team their chance to work with the Royal Navy who povided great assistance which the production wouldn't have been possible without. The behind-the-scenes stories show a few difficulties like weather and Katy Manning's trousers shrinking after getting wet (and the zipper breaking). Roger Delgado didn't like the water because he couldn't swim while Jon Pertwee delighted in doing as many stunts he could. Naval personnel even were extras in many scenes. THE SEA DEVILS was one of two stories that Roger Delgado was in during season nine (he would return for THE TIME MONSTER).

SPECIAL FEATURES:
The six episode story have isolated score, production note subtitles, and audio commentary options. The audio commentary is by director Michael Briant, producer Barry Letts, and script editor Terrance Dicks while being moderated by Andrew Cartmel (a former story editor of Doctor Who).

HELLO SALIOR! is an amusing and informative behind-the-scenes documentary on the making of THE SEA DVEILS which also touches on how great an actor Jon Pertwee was in addition to two of the crew (Dicks, Letts) and Jon Pertwee being former Navy men. Learn how they got the assistance of the Royal Navy. The documentary covers some of the same material that the production note subtitles do (the production notes are amusing to read while watching THE SEA DEVILS).

Also on the DVD is a slide show photo gallery, Trailers for THE SEA DEVILS (and a recap of episode 1 due to a power black out in affected areas when it aired), and DVD-ROM extras (Radio Times listings and the entire text of the 1972 MAKING OF DOCTOR WHO book). First, the most other interesting extra is 8 mm behind-the-scenes film shot by Dave King during the making of the story. It features commentary by Letts, Dicks, and Briant.

FINAL ANALYSIS: THE SEA DEVILS is another fantastic Third Doctor story from Malcolm Hulke with the great acting talents of Jon Pertwee, Roger Delgado, Katy Manning, and others. It is a good companion piece to watch after THE SILURIANS. The DVD extras compliment the extras on that disc too.

this DVD review is (c)6-13-2008 David Blackwell and cannot be reprinted without permission. send all comments to lord_pragmagtic@hotmail.com  

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