Smeggin' Hell!

Well, we're a week late - but on the 15th of February 1988, episode 1 of Red Dwarf, Series 1, aired on BBC2.

Hard to believe 20 years have gone by since the launch of what was to become a favourite amongst sci-fi fans and celebrities (Patrick Stewart is a big fan, don'tcha know...).

With the idea of a film seemingly dead and buried at last, and a ninth TV series turned down by the BBC last year (strange considering the popularity of sci-fi at the moment) it seems that its all over for the crew of the Dwarf. And they never got back to Earth...

The history of Red Dwarf is well documented on the DVDs and here at Cadmium2, we will be covering the show in our own unique style. Let's face it - we have to - it's where we got our name from! That won't be for a little while yet but it doesn't stop us celebrating their anniversary.

Pop along to the Facebook group and join in the discussion of the best and worst of Red Dwarf...

Show 15: Timeslip 2 (The Time of the Ice Box)

Yes, it's that time of the fortnight again! The latest show, our fifteenth, is out there in the Internet ether. In this show, we cover the second story in the Timeslip TV series, called The Time of the Ice Box. There are two more shows in the series, and we are hoping to cover the third in May and the fourth in June.

The Timeslip series is available as a complete boxed set containing all four stories. Click here for some places and prices where you can buy them.

You can download the latest episode direct by clicking here.

If you would like to remind yourself of our coverage of the first tale, The Wrong End of Time, click here.

As usual, you can leave us feedback on the show by visiting the Show 15 Thread on our Facebook group.

The other announcement this month is that we would like to give our listeners a chance to be on the show. There are two possibilities:

1) Join us in studio. This means that you will be with us when we record (either in Daventry, Northants or Hailsham, East Sussex) whatever show we happen to be doing.

2) If you have an opinion on something we have covered and would like to express it in person over the phone, or Skype, we can get you involved in the show that way.

If you are interested in either, either email us of leave a comment on the Facebook Thread set up for that purpose.

Take care, see you all in a fortnight!

BBC7...

In the preamble in show 14, we discuss the merits of some of the shows on BBC7, which is a digital radio station here in the UK. One of the members of our Facebook Group has confirmed for us that you can indeed listen to the station live over the internet and use the listen again function overseas.

So if you like audio drama (science fiction or not) as well as comedy then have a look at the BBC7 homepage. Their Seventh Dimension slot may particularly be of interest to the people who listen to this show, if you click the link it will tell you what is coming up for the next week. The slot is one hour per day, with series running Monday to Friday, and then the Saturday and Sunday slots tend to run independently (it is the weekend slot that usually plays the Big Finish 8th Doctor during their first run).

The serials run from one episode to twenty, some of them are repeats from Radio Four, whilst others are made especially for BBC7. There is some awesome stuff on here (hence this blurb) and I really encourage fans of audio to have a look at it. And if anything amazing comes up I will try and post it on here, but the best way to ensure you miss nothing is to favourite the page from the link above.

Show 14: Doctor Who (The Keys of Marinus)

In this show, we look at the fifth story of the first series of Doctor Who, titled The Keys of Marinus. This is the second story to be written by Dalek creator Terry Nation, and the first of only two shows that he wrote for the show that do not contain the Daleks. It is also much more difficult to get hold of, since it has not been released on DVD yet and is not available on audio CD. Yup, for this show we went back in time and watched a VHS tape, folks!

We have checked, and the story is available from both amazon.co.uk and amazon.com as a second hand item from their marketplaces, but you will pay quite a lot of money for them. As we get into the rare episodes you will find them harder and harder to get hold of, but if they still exist in the BBC archives they will eventually get a DVD release. There are people who like to watch the episodes before we review them, and for those people we have this peice of advice: wait for the DVD release, you will get a much better product than you will on a second hand VHS tape.

And, as you will hear, this is an interesting story - the first of several "quest" type stories for the first Doctor, and this particular story shows many similarities to The Key to Time series from many years later!

As usual, we would love to hear what you think of this show, and as ususal there is a discussion thread set up on our Facebook page.

The episode is already on the podcast feed, and can also be downloaded manually by clicking here.

Next up (on the 20th of this month) is our discussion on the second Timeslip story, The Time of the Ice Box. See you then!

Show 13: Nebulous (Series One)

Show 13 is here, in which we look at Nebulous, the BBC Radio 4 series. As usual, there is a discussion topic on our Facebook page, please contribute your thoughts!

If you would like to download the show manually, click here.

That's it for January, see you in a fortnight for Doctor Who: The Keys of Marinus!

Show 12: Doctor Who (Marco Polo)

The first show this month sees us looking at - or rather listening to - the fourth Doctor Who story from the first ever series. Marco Polo no longer exists in the BBC Video Archives, however luckily some fans made audio copies of the shows as they were transmitted, and it is the case that every story that does not exist on video exists on audio, all of which are now available from the BBC on CD. This play is also available via audible.com – click the link and your browser should direct you to that page.

Marco Polo is the first of many purely historical stories that were quite an integral part of the first few series of Doctor Who. At seven episodes long it is quite lengthy, but worth listening to to try and imagine what it would have looked like!

If you would like to download our show manually, click here.

In a fortnight we cover the first radio show that we have looked at in detail – the first series of Nebulous.

One Hundred Years Ago Today

William Hartnell, the actor who created the role of the Doctor in the 1960s, playing the first incarnation of the character from 1963 to 1966, was born exactly 100 years ago today.

Although ill health forced him to reluctantly relinquish the part in 1966, he remained very fond of the series and in 1972, with his health rapidly deteriorating and memory failing, managed to film one final performance as the character in the tenth anniversary special, The Three Doctors, which aired between December 30, 1972 and January 20, 1973.

It was his final professional performance; he died on April 23, 1975, aged 67.

Happy New Year

It's a couple of days late, but we would all like to wish our listeners a happy new 2008. We have been busy behind the scenes working out what we are going to do this year, and have decided to put out a new show every two weeks instead of two per month (it means we do an extra two episodes in the year, removing the occasional three week wait).

We have also decided to go weekly for the months of May and June, so in those months you will get 8 shows instead of 4, so you can take us on holiday with you! (Please make sure you take us somewhere nice!)

So Cadmium2 will be going thirty shows this year, and the first two come out this month. On the 9th we look at the Doctor Who story Marco Polo, and on the 23rd we look at our first bit of cult radio, the first series of Nebulous.

As usual, we would encourage you to join our Facebook group and leave us feedback, see you in a few days!

Show 11: Doctor Who (The Edge of Destruction)

Welcome to our final show of the year, and so we can keep our suitable festive theme started in our last show when we covered The Box of Delights we now serve you the true turkey that is The Edge of Destruction.

This is the third show in the first run of Doctor Who, and was first broadcast in 1964. It is the ultimate example of what American TV would call a "bottle" show - in that it contains no guest cast and no new sets. It also, as you will know if you have seen it, contains almost no acting and very little script!

This story is not available by itself, but forms the final disc in the "The Beginning" boxed set that contains the whole first three classic Who stories. And a good thing to, becuase really you wouldn't choose to buy this thing by itself!

But you might not agree with us, so if not please do not hesitate to get in touch about it! Contact info is on the panel to the right, and tell us what you thought of this story. You cab also leave comments here if you are a member of our Facebook Group.

You can download the show manually by clicking here.

That's it for 2008, we will see you in a fortnight with our first show on a Doctor Who story that is only available on audio, Marco Polo. That will be released on or around the 9th of January.

From all of us here at Cadmium2 and Futility Radio, have a cracking new year!

Your feedback...

We recently put a poll on the main page about the content of the show. As regular listeners will know we put out two shows every month, one based on Doctor Who, one based on something else, and we wanted to know if you thought we had got the balance right, hence the poll. 68% of you told us we were getting the balance about right, with 12% saying that we put too much emphasis on Who, and the other 20% wanting more Who content! We are pleased with this because it suggests that we got the balance about right.

The next show (which is Doctor Who based) will be out on Boxing Day, and from that point the show will come out every other week on a Wednesday. (At the moment we do two per month, so going every other week means that you will get 26 shows per year out of us instead of 24!) We are also planning to go weekly for two months this year - May and June - so there will be plenty of content available for those of you who are going on holiday and have long journeys there and back.

Please continue to give us feedback, either via this blog or our Facebook Group, we hope to use it in future shows.

See you Boxing Day!

Show 10: The Box of Delights

As it is Christmas, (well almost anyway) we have chosen a Christmassy themed topic for the first December show - the BBC's 1984 adaptation of John Masefields book The Box of Delights. There has been a discussion thread set up on our Facebook group, so please feel free to leave us some feedback on our thoughts or some of your own!

To download the episode manually, click here.

If you don't yet own your own copy of The Box of Delights click here for some links that will enable you to buy it!

In two weeks time (yes, that's Boxing Day folks!) we will be back with a show about the Doctor Who story The Edge of Destruction.

Thanks to everyone who has supported us so far, we really do appreciated it and look forward to more throughout next year (we're really on the ball, we already have five months worth in the can!)

Have a great Christmas!

Verity Lambert, RIP

As all fans of the show will be aware, last month, on the eve of Doctor Who’s 44th anniversary, it’s first producer and creative driving force, Verity Lambert, died at the age of 71.

One of the UK’s foremost television producers, Lambert was the first producer of Doctor Who, in charge of the series from 1963 - 1965. At the age of 28 she was the youngest and only female drama producer working at the BBC.

Over the decades her credits and reputation continued to rise and she became highly respected within the television industry. She oversaw such iconic productions as Adam Adamant Lives, Budgie, The Naked Civil Servant, Rock Follies, Rumpole of the Bailey, Edward and Mrs Simpson, Reilly: Ace of Spies, Minder, Jonathan Creek and Love Soup.

In 1985 Lambert established her own independent production company, Cinema Verity. The company’s first production was the 1988 feature film A Cry in the Dark, starring Sam Neill and Meryl Streep. Cinema Verity’s first television series, the BBC1 sitcom May to December, ran from 1989 until 1994.

In 2000 two of her productions, Doctor Who and The Naked Civil Servant, finished third and fourth respectively in a British Film Institute poll of the 100 Greatest British Television Programmes of the 20th century and in the 2002 New Year’s Honours list Lambert was awarded the O.B.E. for services to film and television production. In the same year she received BAFTA’s Alan Clarke Award for Outstanding Contribution to Television.

At the beginning of this month she was due to receive the lifetime achievement award from the WFTV (Women in Film and Television). However, it was awarded posthumously, WFTV chair Sophie Balhetchet describing Lambert as "a passionate professional, a mentor, an inspiration".

"Women in Film and Television celebrates the achievements of these hugely talented women whose careers span the entire range of jobs in our industry," said Ms Balhetchet, herself a film and TV producer. "Our sadness is that Verity Lambert, whom we honour with our lifetime achievement award, died a few days ago." Lambert was "a truly exemplary woman in the work she produced and the life she lived", she added.

For Andrew, Mike and myself, we have felt moved by this perhaps a little more than we would have expected, as we have been watching Verity's vision unfold for our podcast and only recently finished viewing the entire first season back to back. She will be a great loss to film and television and to the world of Doctor Who.

Verity Ann Lambert, OBE.
27.11.35 - 22.11.07

Show 9: The Tomorrow People (The Slaves of Jedikiah)

Show 9 is here, and this time we have a look at the very first story from the very first series of ITV's The Tomorrow People. This story was originally broadcast from April to June 1973.

As you will hear, we had a few things to say about this serial - it is a great series but sadly the opening episode is not representative of what the show became.

Joining the regular team of Paul, Mike and Andrew is Wendy from Sending a Wave (our sister Firefly/Serenity podcast) as well as Kevin (who is about to launch a splendid pub based podcast called The Great Barred.

The DVD of the serial can be purchased via the price comparison site on the end of this link (in fact it is cheaper to purchase it as part of the series one boxed set or if you really like it, you can get the whole lot for a very reasonable price by visiting Big Finish by clicking here (at the time we wrote this it was a fantastic £35!)

You can download this episode of Cadmium2 direct by clicking here.

Hope you enjoy the show - next up is BBC TV's Christmas serial The Box of Delights which is out in a fortnight on the 12th of December. Also, we really look forward to your thoughts on the shows we cover - either email us (see to the right) or leave a comment on the discussion board at our Facebook Group.

Show 8: Doctor Who (The Daleks)

The first Cadmium2 this month examines the second story of the first series of Doctor Who - the story that arguably put Doctor Who on the map. The Daleks, by Terry Nation, is a seven episode story that is available to buy as part of The Beginnings boxed set.

Thanks for the feedback that we have been receiving - we will cover some of that off in one of our December shows, which is in fact the first show that we have recorded since we launched - all of the first nine shows were recorded just as we put out the first couple of shows!

Show 8 can be downloaded by clicking here.

Next up in a fortnight is the first ever Tomorrow People story, with Wendy from Sending a Wave and Kevin Beaumont, who has also been heard on our sister show.

See you in a couple of weeks!

November Update...

Just to let you all know the details of what you can expect from Cadmium2 in November:

14th: Doctor Who (The Daleks)
28th: The Tomorrow People (The Slaves of Jedikiah).

We have the December shows already recorded as well, (more on those later) and then in November we are all taking a week off work to record the first batch of shows for 2008. We will be covering our first radio series, another Bond, more Doctor Who (of course) and an awful lot more.

We keep meaning to do radio and never seem to get around to it, but the poll we put up on the site a while back suggests that cult radio is as much on your agenda as cult TV, with films and books way down the list!

We also have plans to do extra episodes in the Summer so that you can take us with you on holiday! We are very pleased and encouraged by the number of downloads we are getting and by the feedback we are getting which suggests that we are getting something right. We had actually recorded the first nine shows pretty much before we started releasing the podcast so that is why we have not really featured a lot of your comments within the body of the show, that will change from show ten!

Please continued to give us feedback on the show, and thanks you all for your support so far!

Show 7: The Stone Tape

Show 7 has been released today. In this, we cover Nigel Kneale's (of Quatermass fame) The Stone Tape, a play first broadcast in 1972 on Christmas Day on BBC2. We have a sneaking suspicion that the DVD has been deleted, but we are sure that if you look hard enough online you will be able to find it somewhere for a reasonable price.

If you wish to download Show 7 direct, click here.

Next month, we once again have two shows for you: we look at the second Doctor Who story The Daleks which introduced the most famous adversary to the series. We also look at the very first story of The Tomorrow People which is called The Slaves of Jedikiah. These will be released on the 14th and 28th of next month. Also just a reminder that the show has a Facebook Group, which can be accessed by clicking here. Please do join as it is a very easy way to leave us feedback, and we get to know who and where our listeners are.

See you all next month.

Show 6 now out!

Show six we look at The Tribe of Gum, which is the latter three episodes of the opening Doctor Who story. The story is available on DVD as part of "The Beginnings" boxed set, for some places to buy this click here.

The episode can be manually downloaded by clicking here.

In two weeks show seven will be available, which is about Nigel Kneales "The Stone Tape."

Please keep your feedback coming, from show nine we will be hoping to include your thoughts on the show we are covering. So, to that end, we would welcome some email comments (or even voicemails, see to the right for information on either) on the following two shows:

The Box of Delights
Doctor Who: The Edge of Destruction.

We welcome your reviews and comments - please keep voicemails to about one minute, and email comments need to be able to be read in a minute. Thanks in advance!

October on Cadmium 2...

There are two shows out this month:

Show 6 comes out on the 10th, and is covering the remainder of the very first Doctor Who story, by some known as The Tribe of Gum and by others as An Unearthly Child parts 2-4. Whatever you wish to call it, we let you know all about it and what we thought of it.

Show 7 is all about the 1972 BBC TV Movie The Stone Tape by Nigel Kneale, which was released on DVD in 2001 by the British Film Institute. The show is out on the 24th.

See you on the 10th...

RIP Miss Moneypenny

Sad news reported this morning for fans of the James Bond films across the world.

Lois Maxwell, the original Miss Moneypenny, has died at the age of 80. She joins Bernard Lee and Desmond Llewellyn, leaving Sean Connery the only surviving member of the original MI6 line up.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7020553.stm

Show 5: James Bond (Tomorrow Never Dies)

Show 5 has been released today. With Wendy from Sending a Wave as a guest reviewer, we get stuck in after watching the 18th Bond movie. This is the first movie we have covered on Cadmium 2, please let us know what you think.

You can download show 5 directly by clicking here.

That's it for this month, next month we look at the last three episodes of the opening Doctor Who adventure (by some known as The Tribe of Gum) as well as The Stone Tape - a 1970s play by Nigel Kneale! We will update you with release dates closer to the time.