Doctor Who's LOST Masterpiece - Doctor Who: Marco Polo (1964) - REVIEW 

Marco Polo’s narration with map illustrations almost gives vibes of Indiana Jones

It's just such a great story on so many levels. Watching it I get the sense that Susan is Ping Cho's first real friend -- she probably spent most of her life surrounded by court advisors and suitors and this is the first time she gets to meet a regular girl who is her same age, its understandable how they instantly become inseparable. All the scenes where Ping Cho asks Susan if she really has to leave and that she makes sure she at least says goodbye tear my heart out. In the final episode where Ping Cho says "they are my friends forever", right before they get in the TARDIS to never return makes me so sad, and Marco's final narration is just a beautiful ending to a beautiful story

You want to know something even worse about the status of Marco Polo's records of it being missing? Around the 1990s, Nigeria had the full film recordings of Season 1 and Season 2. Two full seasons of '60s Who right there and then to be returned to the BBC archives. However, a BBC intern had said to the Nigerian Boardcasting Station that "they're all out on video". Nigeria is known to have destroyed those copies. If we are lucky, the same person who took Web 3 might have taken something from Marco Polo.

They should have had a scene in which everyone was lost in the water, and Marco had to find them as they called out to him.

Fs in chat for Josh Snares

It would be amazing if someone miraculously found all 7 episodes in time for the 60th anniversary. If stories like Enemy of the World and individual parts of Web of Fear, Galaxy 4 and The Underwater Menace can be found before the 50th anniversary, who’s to believe we might find other missing episodes by then?

*My favourite Hartnell story and favourite historical story.* The story’s writing is beautiful, it’s characters are beautifully written, (according to surviving pictures and production photos) it looked beautiful, it’s music is beautiful, it was one of the Classic Series’ great gems and it kills me every time knowing that all 7 episodes are missing. The idea that for 7 weeks in 1964, the Doctor, Susan, Ian and Barbra journeyed with Marco Polo across Cathay to see the Mighty Kublai Khan is inspiring and is the sought of thing that the Doctor would mention in a passing line because it would have been to big to do which just shows the great variety in 60s Doctor Who. Some may say that it’s too long but I would heavily disagree and say that one should not treat those stories like a simple one off episode of a nearly 60 year old show and rush through it, especially with the 60s stories. Treat it like a mini series and treat each episode individually.

The Abominable Snowmen is the one whose disappearance is the one I miss the most. Aged 5 it is the very first story I remember watching on its broadcast. A part of my memory can never be refreshed.

I completely agree! Of all the stories to be missing, THIS is the one that hurts the most.

I would like some future Who stories to take place over a large period of time as this one does. I just want some more risk taking & experimentation, I suppose.

I watched this when it was on. It was the first properly historical story on Doctor Who. The first had been cavemen, the second the Daleks. I disagree with the bloke who said it was boring. I remember I loved it, and I went to the junior public library and got out a book on Marco Polo and generally eight year old girls didn’t ask for such things. It stimulated a lifelong fascination with history. I have a BA and an MA in it and used to be on the committee of the London Society for Medieval Studies.

I feel so bad for all the doctor who nerds whose dvd collections will never be complete. the ocd must drive them mad.

I just wish someone would build themselves a TARDIS, bugger off back to the 60's and make copies of all the missing episodes.

This & Dalek's Master Plan R what I'd petition the BBC to crowd fund in order to animate them.

The sad thing about these lost stories is that, despite the quality that some of these early stories hold, if the show didn't keeps it's relevancy, even more stories of Doctor Who could've been completely lost, or at least as far as the general public was concerned. It's a miracle we have/found as many as we have. But at the same time knowing that some are still missing, certainly ones like this, will forever remain saddening. History really, but not even a centenary old before we lost it. I know it's too much to say, but it feels criminal.

In showing my housemates Classic Who, one of them remarked that The Aztecs was when the show Grew The Beard, but I argued that, if Marco Polo still properly existed that would be the one.

A part of me is holding out hope that this story is out there somewhere even if it's just an episode or two and that it's in a private collector's hands and then at some point they will let someone see it so they can record the two pieces and send them up to the BBC. I really hope that this story was not destroyed or wiped.

Terry Nation wrote a non-Dalek story??? "My Lord, is that legal???'

I’m loving this content! Really interesting to know about the significant and weird goings on past and present of Doctor Who. Keep it up Mr. Tardis! (PS - Was so angry when I found out it’s lost when watching the classics, that cliffhanger on the previous episode!)

As someone who sat through all seven episodes of this on its original broadcast, I can say that I thought it was very boring. I was ten when Doctor Who started and was immediately captivated by it. I was intrigued by the first story of the cavemen, I loved the Dalek serial and even the two part inside the Tardis story was interesting. But the Marco Polo story was interminable to a boy of my age, even though I was interested in history. I thought the Aztecs was much better because it was only four episodes and had a conciseness that this story completely lacked. I thought The Keys of Marinus that followed this story was much better.

I've always liked the concept that the Doctor and companions are essentially landlocked. That they can't just hop in the Tardis and leave whenever they feel like it.

Mr tardis. Honestly. As a 9 year old this story was zzzzzzzzzzzz. Can still remember it

I love the Doctor's laughter in the first episode. Scripted or not, it works for me.

I'm hoping one day Marco Polo will get animated ( if The animation makes a comeback )

That moment when Barbara and Susan talk under the stars has to be my favorite moment of the entire era. Like, it's like something out of the revival. i actually felt a real connection through it, even without any music. Now, I was born in the wilderness years, so I do find the 60s era stuff a bit slow, but this, this was incredible.

This is one of the stories I'd most want to see recovered alongside the crusade, daleks Masterplan and the massacre

Easily my favourite Hartnell story, and honestly in my top 10 of all time (maybe even top 5).

These episodes HAVE to exist somewhere. With the amount of people having watched it and the amount of countries that broadcast it there must be a copy somewhere. I know personal recording devices were not very common back then but out of the millions of people that watched these episodes chances are someone recorded it and just forgot about it in an attic or something. I hope.

I envy the people who found this serial not boring. By the third time the group tried to convince marco that he was being duped, I was checked out. A few episodes too long of the same thing over and over. The Hartnell scenes, the susan scenes and the overall arch of Ping Cho's were compelling to me, but so drawn out

I wish I had a TARDIS to retrieve the lost episodes...this series might be at the top of my list...on that note, I really enjoyed this review! Thanks, Mr. TARDIS.

Fun fact: Ping-Cho (Zienia Merton) would later go on to play as Data Analyst Sandra Benes in Gerry Anderson's Space 1999 in 1975

20:50 This EvilDalek79 sounds like a nerd! 🤓

Honestly, considering this story was a blast to watch, DESPITE being a lose cannon reconstruction, which are the bane of my existance due to my incredibly short atention span, I'd say this story is really good, and like you said, really is the holy grail of missing Doctor Who serials.

Absolutely adored this story. Imagination was enough for me, i keep on forgetting that it's lost ❤

Just finished listening to it. Great story!

I have greatly enjoyed the Loose Cannon reconstructions of Marco Polo. I hope episodes of this serial are found someday.

I think that Derren Nesbit played Thomas Dodd in Big Finish's Doctor Who: Spare Parts

The audiobook of the novelization, or there one built from episode audio?

I’ve been thinking over the last week since using AI ChatGPT for some creative projects, if we will be only a few years away from an AI totally recreating the entire 7 episode story based on all available source material. This would be the most epic reclamation of lost works in human history.

Cathay not cafe.

"Playing with Kublai and being so good that he wins half of asia" Yup, that's the First Doctor to you all, just an ordinary day in Old Hartnel's life.

I hope this can be remade as an audio drama and as an animated reconstruction of all seven episodes.

I like Marco Polo

I might need to watch this now

I kind of wish the BBC had their own time machine so they could go back and record all those lost episodes when they came out. Also, they could have early Doctors show up for their anniversaries

I met Derren Nesbitt a few years ago and as I love the recon asked him about it and if he'd want it to be found some day. To my surprise he was very negative saying "oh god no. Who wants 7 episodes returned of some cheap silly children's program"...I was actually shocked and slightly annoyed that he held it in so little regard

2:52 poor josh.

2:13 You know, I thought you were going to say "the yellowface". 7:15 Did she use the honorific "sama"? 14:30 Yeah, I prefer this interpretation and it makes so much more sense. Listen to the start of his laughter. That's weep-laughing. That's "I'm going insane!" laughter. "I know he is, yet still!" The Doctor proclaims. This isn't a flub, he's in-character aware he should not be laughing at this moment. And why wouldn't he be? He stole the damn thing in the first place! The sheer _irony_ of the situation. This great explorer is stealing the thing he stole to see the universe. And it's all his fault. He never read her manual, he never learned how she worked, he didn't bother getting paranoid about fixing her when the Chameleon Circuit broke, he _just_ almost died because of another technical fault, and the only reason they're even out here with these humans is because he decided "whelp they know too much, time to kidnap them and abscond from this time period!" This is the death of, as the extended "canon" says his real name is, d³∑x₂ (or Theta Sigma for short) and the true birth of The Doctor. It's all processing right now for him; who he is, what he is, what he was, what he shall be, and it's basically the heroic equivalent of The Joker's One Bad Day. It fits his arc so well, because we get another instant classic Doctorism by the end: he makes the weirdest friends, his first approach is friendship and peace. Before, he was still a Time Lord at his heart, so convinced of his own superiority. The laughing madness is that he realizes he's no better than a human and in fact is at his heart more akin to Marco than anything. He just got screwed over a man who, without his ego preventing him from accepting it, is so much like him. And within a short time by his standards, he's become able to become instant besties with a human he just met, something _impossible_ for this man beforehand. The laughing works perfectly.

They most likely did not hire Asians from the outside of BBC, and just hired from central casting as a cost saving. The yellow face by todays standard is unacceptable but you have to remember not to judge from outside the time period. Hopefully they will find a copy of this in a box stored somewhere on an old shelf

They should remake the entire story with David Bradley and Claudia Grant. Also recast, Ian and Barbara. With the added bonus of casting actual Chinese actors.

Am I the only one looking at the thumb nail wondering whether the TARDIS has a flat.. (Oh wow! It was actually broken xD )

A great story but far too long!

Why is this lost. I recently started watching the original series on tubi because they added William hertnell up to Sylvester McCoy

19:35 Pathos rhymes with "doss", not "dose". "Pathowce"is a silly Americanised mangling of the word, for which there is no excuse or justification. Pathos, thanos, kudos, mythos (etc) are all Greek words explicitly spelt with a short "o" (omicron) as in "cod", not a long "o" (omega) as in "code".

The historical episodes in season 1 are really good apart from the cavemen while the sci fi ones tend to be bullocks. I wish they did more stuff like this where the doctor just had an adventure with a historical figure without aliens and the like involved.

I was a teenager when this aired. I remember it as tedious boring claptrap lacking any of the excitement or compulsion required by a Saturday evening serial. Getting wiped was the best thing that could happen to it for the sake of future generations. Actually, all the Who historicals were at the best, poor. It took the programme far too long to realise this and abandon them to the abyss where they belonged.

What's with the backg.round music? It has nothing to do with Doctor Who

If you really want to make an Italian mad, tell them that Marco Polo introduced them to pasta thanks to China. Then tell them that you boil pasta with olive oil and pour pasta water down the drain.