DOCTOR WHO: THE INFINITE QUEST (2008)

Doctor Who : Infinite Quest - Complete Animated BBC Series

Actors: David Tennant
Format: Animated, Color, DVD-Video, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
Language: English
Subtitles: English
Number of discs: 1
Studio: BBC Warner
DVD Release Date: November 18, 2008
Run Time: 80 minutes

Movie: * ½
Disc: * ½

The front cover proclaims this to be a “feature-length” animation, which is an outright lie. This 2007 produced feature barely runs 48 minutes – hardly “feature-length” which one normally takes to be in the hour-and-a-half range. (In fact 48 minutes is about the running time of an average “new” Doctor Who episode.)

The lie is perpetuated on the back of the DVD box where the “feature length” is proclaimed to be 80 minutes. It may be factually correct once one adds the collective running time of the several dull “special” features, but is still quite misleading.

Once one gets over the disappointingly brisk running time, there isn’t much in Doctor Who: The Infinite Quest that appeals. The one accurate bit of marketing on the box is that this is indeed a “Children’s DVD”. The “movie” in fact consists of several short animated bits cobbled together and broadcast as part of the Totally Doctor Who TV show.

It tells one single story line though, taking place somewhere during Season Three of the new Doctor Who series starring David Tennant as the Doctor and Freema Agyeman as his loyal sidekick Martha. The plot is on the simplistic side and involves a curiously slow on the uptake time-travelling Doctor and Martha following clues across several planets to find a mythical spaceship called the Infinite, which will bestow one’s “heart’s desire” to whomever finds it. This reviewer’s “heart’s desire” would be an actual feature-length Doctor Who movie that adults can enjoy too, but this isn’t it.

WORTH IT? Adult fans of the new Doctor Who TV show will be wasting their money. Small children may be transfixed, but we found the animation to be a curious mixture of static South Park-style cut-out human figures placed against a colourful and often vibrant background. It has its moments (and retaining the original voice talent from the live action show was a good idea) but remain a disappointment thanks to the running time.