Rating: 
Summary: More like this, please
Review: A lovely package with superb extras. While the episodes contained in this full-season set are not first-rate Doctor Who, like many of the other single-story DVDs that have been released thus far (like The Aztecs, Caves of Androzani, etc.), they are tremendous fun, and this set has an advantage over the other Doctor Who DVDs in that it presents a complete season rather than a snapshot of a season. The Androids of Tara stands out as truly exceptional comic fantasy, strangely like a 1970s British sci-fi Princess Bride. The Pirate Planet is hilarious and imaginative despite some dodgy effects, and The Stones of Blood boasts an intriguing cast of characters that is almost unique in science fiction television. I hope that the BBC will soon begin issuing more entire seasons of this show. Several of the Doctors (especially 2,6,7, and 8) were in so few episodes that it would be easy to release all their remaining stories in boxed sets. While Marco Polo and Reign of Terror are missing episodes, and while the Aztecs has already been released, I want to see a Season 1 boxed set that places the first year of the show (in its most complete form), onto the DVD format. As a long-time fan, I would love the opportunity to finally see how the show began, and such a DVD set would also be a wonderful way to introduce the show to new viewers by bringing them in on the ground floor. And, of course, everyone wants Tom Baker's first two years out on DVD.
Rating:
Summary: Not the first season with a running link
Review: As all good Dr. Who fans know. The first season to have a running link between all the episodes was season 8--- The Master Season. The person who said that season 16 was the first season to have a running link should rexamine his statement. P.S. I love the restoration teams work but is it so bad if they didn't do restoration on these relatively newer episodes. Think of the DVD extras we're getting... those are far more valuable to me as a who fan.
Rating: 
Summary: A must for any Who fan.
Review: At the rate the BBC is releasing Doctor Who on video and DVD it will take years before all the stories are available on each given format. Even after more than 10 years, there are still gaps in the UK video schedule, and at only one story every three months or so, it will take just as many years for all the existing stories to make their way onto DVD. As an owner of a R2 player that has been multi-region enabled, I'm rather pleased that the US has gotten some different releases to the UK. I hope this trend continues, so that I might be able to complete my DVD collection sometime before I die, as unlike the doctor I don't have twelve lives. The six stories making up season sixteen are available either individually or as a boxset. As an international customer it is cheaper to buy each disc individually and avoid customs charges on the more expensive boxset which is priced above the 'tax-free' customs limit ... Each story has a commentary track and pop-up subtitled information tracks in common with their R2 equivilents, but lack the remastering and wealth of other extras provided by the BBC's restoration team, so the picture is not nearly as good as the UK produced discs. It has also been mastered into the US NTSC standard from its UK PAL origins, which doesn't help matters when its converted back to PAL again on a European/UK R2 setup. As for the commentaries, Mary Tamm is present a few times as Romana, and Tom Baker is on a few of the disks also. They double up on "The Ribos Operation", while Baker doubles with John Leeson (voice of K9) on another, and Tamm appears sans-Baker on "Armageddon Factor". Tamm at least has done her homework, while Baker just appears to have wandered in off the street and reveals little of interest. The Key to Time season has yet to appear on any R2 release lists. If it ever does, it may have more extras, or it may not. That's not to say the existing extras are inadequate, for they aren't. It should certainly have better picture quality, but for now its just nice knowing the option is there to expand your Doctor Who collection on DVD just that little bit quicker, and for me at least, that's what really counts.
Rating: 
Summary: A mixed bag, but most worth it.
Review: Dr. Who was always quite inconsistant in its writing and production. A typical season mixes absolute gems (like Ark in Space, or Talons of Weng Chiang), with near drek (like Revenge of the Cybermen or Underworld). While there are certainly exceptions, the 16th season was not one of them. None of the stories of the season are likely to make my Top 10 list, but Ribos Operation and Androids of Tara would both squeak into my Top 20. At the bottom, Power of Kroll was so bad that I'll admit to having not gotten around to watching it yet! The rest of the set (Stones of Blood, Armageddon Factor, and Pirate Planet) are quite watchable, but nothing special. [IMO, Doug Adams brand of humor just doesn't work within the parameters of Dr. Who.] As for the DVDs themselves, despite what some other reviews said, the picture quality seemed fine to me, with no annoying problems. The spoken commentary by various actors and directors was generally interesting. Are their memories REALLY that good, or have they just been telling the same stories at various conventions for the past 2 decades?
The on-screen information text ranged from interesting (lots of production details and information about script changes) to the tedius (long lists of acting credits for virtually every actor to appear in Armageddon Factor.) One small complaint here is that the white text (used both for the info-text and for the captions)was a bit hard to read. But to balance that complaint, while I haven't watched all the discs with the captions, the ones I've seen seem to be accurate! (A vast improvement over the videos, on which the captions are both extremely simplified [whole lines of dialogue left out or rewritten [[perhaps they assume that the viewers are all little kids, who can't read very well?]]], and, often, just plain wrong. [Written by people are are completely unfamiliar with the series, and have trouble understanding English accents.]) Oh, and lest we forget the BEST thing about this boxed set! Once you get the large box open, the individual DVDs are NOT sealed into their individual cases. (I'd like to know who decided that it was necessary to seal up DVD cases like they contained the crown jewels?)Just pop 'em open and go. Almost makes it worth paying for Power of Kroll.
Rating:
Summary: The "First Romana" Stories
Review: I honestly can't explain why this series was released on DVD before such excellent (and one would assume, with potentially more DVD-appropriate material) stories as Battlefield and The Curse of Fenric. The only reasons I can think of are (1) Sylvester McCoy was never as popular in the US as Tom Baker and (2) Mary Tamm was absolutely gorgeous as the first Romana. Tom was indeed starting to get a bit over-bearing in this season, as has been mentioned by many others. But Mary...oh Mary! (How could such a love-goddess have such a plain name?). She first caught my attention many years ago in "Tales That Witness Madness" in her divine nudity. What a face - what an accent - what a body! Then she appeared in "The Key to Time", followed shortly after by yet another unclothed appearance in "The Odessa File" (with Jon Voight). But her bottom lives on (as it was 20 years ago) in my fantasies of today. And her haughty demeanor as Romana was so inspiring that I even named my first daugher after the character! In summary: if you already have the VHS tapes, it's still worth buying the DVDs if only for Mary's commentaries. Oooooh....
Rating: 
Summary: Dr Who is GREAT , but Brit TV is SLOOOOW
Review: I just bought this set based upon fond memories of 20 years ago. Technically it is GREAT. Great color & sound. I love those cute young Brit women who are 50 now! Stories are good too. BUT I forgot how boring these stories can be. If the Doc is onscreen, the action & dialog is good. If he isn't there, forget it! It just drags on & on. Wish I were a Time Lord to leap to the next scene. A typical 99 minute segment could easily be cut down to 60 minutes or less with no loss in content. I would not buy this again.
Rating:
Summary: GRRRRRREAT!
Review: I love this collection. True, there are not many extras on them, but the color is very clear and the sound is great. I only had 1 on video and had never seen THE ARMAGGEDON FACTOR completely. Mary Tamm was really one of the better companions for Tom Baker - the beginning of the STONES OF BLOOD emphasizes this. I have only one beef with the BBC in general - why can't they just release the remaining Doctor Whos on DVD instead of releasing them piecemeal? This collection was one of their best ideas. Now is the time to release those E-Space and Black Guardian trilogies on DVD, or better yet, complete seasons! It will take them years to release them on DVD at the rate they are going, and certainly people might lose interest by then! And the BBC releases only 6 videos a year, so everyone in the UK and Australian see them months to over a year before we do.
Rating:
Summary: Compatabilty
Review: I would love to be able to review this collection but unfortunately my DVD players are not compatible. Its rather unfortunate that this is not available on region 2 for the uk!
Rating:
Summary: Jeffrey's right
Review: I've been a Dr. Who fan for a LONG time and I have waited for the dvds to come out. I have 9 vhs covering some of the William Hartnell, Jon Pertwee, Tom Baker and Sylvester McCoy. I loved the "The Key of Time" series, heck I love the whole series. Looking forward to all the episoded to come out on dvd.
Rating:
Summary: Why on earth did the BBC remaster this bunch of duds first?
Review: It was an ambitious idea - link all the serials in a single season of Dr. Who together as a continuous story. Unfortunately, the execution of the idea failed disastrously. After getting off to a mediocre start in "The Ribos Operation", things pick up a bit with the amusing - if implausible (even for Dr. Who) - "The Pirate Planet" before crashing into a morass of silliness ("The Stones Of Blood"), pointlessness ("The Androids Of Tara"), stupidity (the incredibly racist "Power Of Kroll") and incoherent boredom ("The Armageddon Factor"). There are a few bright spots, mostly involving the characters and quality acting. Baker delivers his last solid season performing the Doctor, as his work in the next (the program's 17th) would find him camping it up to get through some truly childish scripts the censors apparently foisted on the production. His performance in the 18th season - his final with the program - was even worse, coming across entirely lifeless. He probably should have left the program after the 16th season's closer, "The Invasion Of Time" - it was obvious the quality of the program was sliding by that point. Mary Tamm is effective as Romana, portraying her as a cold sophisticate but one with integrity and more than a hint of compassion and curiosity. Her high-class manners are a perfect foil for Baker's Bohemian Doctor. I can't help but wonder though if the Doctor's companion was originally slated to be the Rodan character Leela ran around with during much of "The Invasion Of Time" - the two characters are quite similar (as are their names). Effective guest characters and performances dot the Key To Time season as well, particularly in "The Ribos Operation" (the hysterical confidence men Garron and Unstoffe, two more vivid characters from longtime Who writer Robert Holmes), "The Pirate Planet" (the Pirate, obviously), and "The Stones Of Blood", which benefits greatly from Beatrix Lehmann's sparkling performance as the elderly archeologist Professor Amelia Rumford. Susan Engel's portrayal of Vivien Fay (who turns out to be more than she at first appears) amusingly - and possibly intentionally - hints at lesbianism. It's certainly one of the most estrogen-charged episodes of Dr. Who ever filmed - the two leading female guests and Tamm's Romana practically carry the first couple of episodes. Unfortunately, the script works *only* as camp - which is a pity, as the producers apparently try to take it seriously! The final three stories of the season are of far lower quality. "The Androids of Tara" is a dull attempt at a swashbuckling Robin Hood-style medieval fairytale adventure, one that's not so much awful as pointless. True awfulness is reserved for the hysterically racist "The Power Of Kroll", which plays like a rejected Jon Pertwee-era tale and is hands down the worst script Who-veteran Robert Holmes ever produced for the program. A lot of people slam the monster special effect itself, however I find it particularly good by Dr. Who standards - certainly better than similar giant monsters from earlier serials (such as "Terror of the Zygons" and "Seeds Of Doom"). Of course, anyone watching Dr. Who for the effects is seriously missing the point (or very easily amused!). "The Armageddon Factor" ends an up-until-that-point mediocre season on a terribly incoherent, depressing and dull note, with poor production values and a bunker atmosphere that unsuccessfully attempts to recall older Who adventures like "Genesis of the Daleks" and "Inferno". Lalla Ward's overripe performance as Princess Astra doesn't help matters - I'm frankly stunned the producers tagged her to take over the Romana role for the next season. It's easily the worst 6-parter of Tom Baker's long run with the show. It's a shame the BBC wasted time and resources transferring this sorry bunch of stories to DVD when so many worthy Tom Baker serials remain unavailable in the format, including "The Sontaran Experiment", "Genesis Of The Daleks", "Terror Of The Zygons", "Pyramids Of Mars", "The Deadly Assassin", "Face Of Evil", "The Talons Of Weng-Chiang" (easily the best 6-parter Doctor Who ever produced), "The Sunmakers", "The Invasion Of Time", "City Of Death", "The Leisure Hive", "Warrior's Gate", and "The Keeper Of Traken". Any one of those adventures is superior to anything the Key To Time season had to offer, and unfortunately at the rate the BBC is producing these discs, it will be years before they'll all become available. Oh well. At least we've gotten "The Robots Of Death" and "The Ark In Space" to watch on DVD. That's better than nothing, I suppose.
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