INSPIRATION
One of the things I had always wanted to do with Action Figure Theatre was to make it more inclusive and get other people involved, whether in writing stories, filming or editing but I could never really make it work. Over the time, we did have a stories by Jack Rees, Jim Sangster and Dave Spilsbury and art work from Luke Spillaine and Aaron Vanderkley.
In 2012, I mentored a group through the process of making their own one-part AFT story. This was one of those, written by Steve A Williams. What was his inspiration?
"This story was originally dreamt up over 2 years before but it stopped on page 2. That was it, a one page joke. The idea for it came from a 10th Doctor figure that had lost its hand - it was going to be bitten off by the T-Rex"
It was such an ambitious and imaginative story. Steve took the brief and totally ran with it (no pun intended) and made it his own, pushing the boundaries of the format.
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CAST
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The 10th Doctor, Martha Jones, Teletubbies, The Celestial Toymaker (custom)
"I've always felt that Martha was an underused character and wanted to use her, which meant I had to use the tenth Doctor.
The Teletubbies were from my original jokey idea and my daughter still had the toys. The Celestial Toymaker was a custom I started a long time ago and when extending the original idea, a major classic villain seemed a good idea and I had recently listened to the Big Finish Companion Chronicles Solitaire, in which he features. The custom uses a Host body (Voyage of the Damned), Dr Constantine head and loads of Green Stuff."
It's an excellent recipe for one of the great and definitely underused villains of the 60s. I love Steve's attention to detail on the Toymaker's robes, wonderful!
SCRIPT
Steve changed the story (having lost the T-Rx figure). Phil encouraged me to develop the story firther (and helped with the rhymes). I developed the script with him, altering it when I composed it on screen.
The story uses elements from The Mind Robber, The Celestial Toymaker and The Sound of Drums as well as (on pages 2, 3 and part of 4) the layout of Rupert The Bear. Did anyone spot the hidden TARDIS in the layout?
SHOOTING
Most shooting was done in March 2011, with various pictures of the Doctor, Martha and the Teletubbies, their house and the TARDIS. The Toymaker was taken later, when the custom was finished, along with shots of the Doctor and Martha tied up.
EDITING
Editing took a long time because of the fx I used. For the first page I used Daz Studio for cgi work on the first page. The Teletubby landscape was originally modelled in cgi but because it wasn't good enough, I took screen grabs from a library Teletubby DVD. (The jungle set and dinosaur were made by others).
The speech bubbles are colour coded because I knew that there would be a fair amount of dialogue and I wanted to make it very clear who was speaking at all times. I borrowed the idea from Neil Gaiman's The Sandman (Vertigo Comics).
One thing I learned about photographing is that I really need to learn how to 'green screen' the figures - I wasted a lot of time cleaning up the background noise before I could cut'n'paste the figures into new settings! (BTW the penknife on page 4 is my own)
Steve's editing on this story really is top notch, bearing in mind every frame has required work and none of the backgrounds are real (apart from the TARDIS interior, but even those frames needed a 'green screen' background.)
Particular highlights are the first image of page three, where a combination of flawless cut and paste, and excellent lighting make it look like the Doctor and Martha really are in the tubby house.
Also, take a look at the last frame of page two. I didn't know the Martha figure came with eyelids!
Another thing I love is how the 'Rupert Bear' format appears as we enter the Land of Fiction, really creating the illusion that we're intruding somewhere that already exists.
CONTINUITY
The story fits between Smith & Jones and The Shakespeare Code. I posited that the Doctor took Martha into the distant past first before visiting Elizabethan Britain. I love the idea that the TARDIS team are in the middle of an adventure we know nothing about - the TV series never uses that and it works really well - see the Indiana Jones films for example. (If you look closely on part one you will see part of the reason for this adventure - this is a deliberate red herring for later!)
The implication that the Toymaker and the TARDIS are heading to the same place is not accidental.
SUMMARY
In summary, Steve was one of the reasons I decided to do the AFT Writers' Group project in the first place. He was one of the people that had expressed a desire to do a story but wasn't sure where to start so I'm really glad he has done it.
What he's produced is vibrant in its colours, showing Steve's enthusiasm. His story is incredibly imaginative and utterly ambitious in terms of execution and its a real credit to Steve that he's persevered and seen it through to its conclusion.
I'd like to thank Phil for the opportunity to do this, I've learned an awful lot on the way.
Steve's passion for the story has been evident from the beginning. Every so often I'd get a flurry of emails from him as he finds time to work on it, full of ideas and work-in-progress pictures. I'm really glad he saw it through as I think he's created something truly unique, fun and full of whimsical Who-iness.
TRANSMISSION
This originally appeared on the AFT in January 2012. It's back, posted on 9th December 2023 to coincide with the return to our screens of the Toymaker!
