Whether you take a photo of a puddle of vomit in colour or black and white, nothing changes the fact that it's vomit.

I blummin LOVE The Happiness Patrol. Glorious! I love the Kandyman answering his phone "Kandyman!". The sinister fairground music as the Fondant Surprise gloops through the pipes. Helen A is fantastic, and Sheila Hancock puts in one of the best villain performances in the whole show (her final scene, with Fifi's death, is one of the show's great moments). Joseph C and Helen A's relationship. Gilbert M and the Kandyman. Joseph and Gilbert running off together in the spaceshuttle. Rachel (were there any sexual problems?) Bell can do no wrong. The whole idea of sadness being punishable by death, and the black balloons at the execution ... excellent, excellent, excellent stuff.

On the downside, it all looks a bit cheap. The Doctor talking the two snipers out of shooting the protest march is a bit overdone. The Pipe People don't really convince and their dialogue is a bit muffled by the masks.

This will definitely be getting an 8/10 from me in the DWM poll this month. It's fun and it's funny, with some great moments, and the Kandyman must have scared the littleuns under the carpet.

I really don't want to see any of McCoy's 'portal of who'

The nadir. The story that proved it was time for the show to end.

Its defenders always point to its anti-Thatcher political subtext as though it was cutting edge or something. Trouble is, Thatcher satires had been done to death by the time The Happiness Patrol was written. By then, parodies had to be very witty and clever to register. This was neither. Far from it.

In the McCoy era, you are talking about 'least awful' rather than actually 'best'. Its all relative.

Happiness Patrol was awful, but was nowhere near the heartbreakingly naff stories like Paradise Towers and (gag) Time and the Rani

This is a Werid one for me, I can remeber watching it as a kid and loving Fifi. As an adult I thought it wold be awful. However, I enjoyed watching this the other day, there's a lot of black hum ooh and I love the doctor as an anarchist. The kandyman was great. Love it.

I'm glad you happy.

I really love this story.

This was the first episode of Dr Who that I ever saw, so it still holds a special meaning for me, even though I can understand the negative reviews if you see what I mean?
Personally I love it.

Sadly, that could never happen. Bassett's were, understandably, none too pleased at the obvious rip-off of their mascot and the BBC narrowly avoided a massive lawsuit by promising never to use the character again, ever.

TBH, I wonder how they thought they'd get away with it...

From what I remember (think I read this in 'The Frame', but not sure), The Kandyman was supposed to look more like a human being, but obiviously fashioned out of various types of confection.

It was only later that someone had the bright idea of "Hey, lets have Bertie Basset as the monster in Doctor Who!" - which led to someone else saying: "That's dead brill, lets do it!". If you look at the other design decisions that were made on the production, this all kind of falls into place.

Being a Thatcher satire, I would say he was closer to Norman Tebbit, personally.

I'd never thought of that!

Does that mean that Joseph C is Ken Clarke?

Sir Keith Joseph, surely?

I loved all of the seventh
But I never realised this wS antitory

So much for cutting edge satire, BBC, 0 out of 10 yet again

I'm yet to view The Happiness Patrol so I can't really comment much at this point. However from what you say above & what else I've heard, I just wonder it reads more like a surreal story from the first or second Doctor such as The Celestial Toy Maker or The Mind Robber. I just wonder, had it been released with either the first or second Doctor it might have got a lot more appreciation and be considered a cult classic even -? -what do others think?

Well, it would've definately been in black and white then!

At the time, and doesn't look like things have changed!, it was a very divisive episode...one of the most 'marmite-y' in the programme's history, so don't think it will ever be up there with 'The Mind Robber' with general fandom. (I've obviously only seen 'Celestial Toymaker' Episode 4 which is IMO only okay. Not as good as the photographs suggested before I saw it!)

For "cult classic" may I cautiously put forward the wonderfully surreal and multi-layered 'The Greatest Show in the Galaxy'?

(Be gentle with me, McCoy dislikers. )

Greatest Show is qutie well received, as it has scary bits and nasty bits and some nice location stuff. But it stuill has its detractors because of Whizzkid and the rap.

The celestial Toymaker soundtrack CD bored the arse off me. I reckon people only rave about that story because they don't know it very well.

I think people rave about it because of the surviving episode which for me is the best of the 4. Having seen the previous three through telesnaps it isn't that brilliant and if by some miracle those episodes should ever turn up, I think it's one story which wouldn't be improved much by watching it, welcome as their discovery would be.

As for Greatest Show, it's an improvement on The Happiness Patrol but suffers similar problems from it's execution onscreen.

All the McCoy stories suffer. Some more than others. I remember liking both Happiness Patrol and Greatest Show (along with, Bannermen, Remembrance and a few others).

Some of them I can't believe were actually broadcast by the BBC, they were that bad. Just look at where McCoy wakes up in Time and the Rani. Man, it's baaaaaaaaaaad. Pretty much all of Dragonfire, I can't remember Silver Nemesis too well - probably a good reason for that.

Starting with the subjective...

As somebody else pointed out on another thread McCoy was clearly (and always will be) "the worst Doctor ever". I think I might have seen some of the original Greatest Show and I did sit through it all on Sky. But I was just irritated by McCoy all the time. Plus ca change....

But on the objective fairness front...

What struck me about the thread dealing with the cancellation of Who was that in some ways McCoy is a Doctor that people have a lot invested in. The show was cancelled because of low ratings and lots of us of a certain age did stop watching making us responsible. So any attempt to revive McCoy's reputation is an indictment of our abandonment of the Doctor in his time of greatest need. By contrast McCoy fans include (i) younger people for whom McCoy was their first Doctor and thus want to defend his reputation and (ii) older viewers who stuck with the show and hoped it would continue who might legitimately feel that the rats deserting the sinking ship were responsible for the demise of the original series. Both of those groups then have an interest in arguing that McCoy wasn't so bad (even though he was).

So in the history of the programme, McCoy is inevitably going to be a divisive figure (and not just because he was rubbish and people won't acknowledge it).

A fairly good summation that I pretty much agree with.

I won't acknowledge it because at the end of the day that really is your opinion and you shouldn't be trying to force people to accept your view. You don't like McCoy and think he is the worse Doctor ever, fair play to you but please don't expect everyone to acknowledge it just because you say so.

In my opinion, and it is just my opinion, McCoy is a fairly decent Doctor who was lumbered with some of the most terrible scripts especially in Season 24. In those stories it is McCoy and McCoy alone who stands out like a shining beacon on a foggy night.

In Season 26 he put in some of his best performances and I just love the way he played The Doctor in Ghost Light. He had some great lines, he was dark, deceitful and quite mischievous all at the same time. The Curse Of Fenric and Survival I enjoyed watching him as well.

I mean, it wasn't as if he was a nasty Doctor, going round strangling people and being quite arrogant like his predecessor did at times at the beginning of his tenure. He was quite pleasant and laid back and only got angry when he needed to. Plus he also had a good dynamic with his Ace.

Overall I thought he was a Doctor with potential that was never truly exploited.

That, though, is my opinion which people can disagree with if they wish. I for one am not going to force it on anyone.

I wouldn't have said that. There were times when I really didn't care for his acting at all but with better writing and direction that needn't have been a problem. I generally blame John Nathan-Turner and Andrew Cartmel for the McCoy era being so poor; they were the ones making the key decisions and in my view they were all pretty terrible.