In popular culture, sometimes the relative value of something does not emerge until decades later. Originally aired in 1966, "Doctor Who: The Power of the Daleks" (8:25 p.m. Saturday, BBC America, TV-PG) is said to be one of the more cherished episodes of the long-running cult series. But the videotape of the episode was tossed out in something the network refers to as an "archive purge" in 1974. An audiotape survived, allowing the missing episode to be reanimated in black and white, hand-drawn style.
This cartoon revival digs deep into the history of the beloved series. It takes place immediately after the regeneration of the First Doctor, William Hartnell, into the Second Doctor, Patrick Troughton, and follows the Time Lord (Troughton) and his companions, Polly (Anneke Wills) and Ben (Michael Craze), as they take on old enemies on the planet Vulcan while simultaneously adjusting to a new Doctor.
The black-and-white animation does a good job of evoking mid-20th century television. I half-wished it had been re-created in the "Supermarionation" style of the old "Thunderbirds." But that might seem sacrilegious to true "Doctor Who" fans.
The "Daleks" episode is hardly the only artifact of TV pop culture to end up in a landfill. Storage of old episodes used to take up a great deal of space and require careful archiving. To business-minded people it might have seemed like an expensive proposition, particularly to save something like television entertainment seen in the pre-digital, or pre-VCR era, as something of fleeting and ephemeral value.
Even a series as popular and star-studded as "The Tonight Show" was considered a throwaway.
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