TVOntario
TV ONTARIO (TVO) (1976-1991?)
Channel Profile
The ONTARIO EDUCATIONAL COMMUNICATIONS AUTHORITY (OECA) was established in 1970 as a Crown Corporation to serve all levels of education in Ontario, Canada. The OECA's headquarters was in Toronto.
In September 1970, the first UHF station in Canada went on the air: known as CICA-TV or TVOntario, this station was operated by the OECA. Additional transmitters were subsequently established throughout the Province in the years that followed. And with the addition of affiliate stations in other cities, the OECA / TVOntario service was available to over 75% of the population of the eastern Province.
The distributor of BBC programming to Canada and the United States was chiefly Time Life Films / Television, and from 1982 Lionheart Television International Inc. From 1987, the distributor was Cinar Films, who operated out of Toronto and Montreal, and who specialised in comedy and drama.
Starting in 1976, TVO enjoyed a virtually unbroken 13-year run of Doctor Who…
Stories bought and broadcast
JON PERTWEE
Eleven stories, 54 episodes; although screened out of order:
| RRR | The Three Doctors | 4 |
| KKK | Day of the Daleks | 4 |
| MMM | The Curse of Peladon | 4 |
| GGG | The Claws of Axos | 4 |
| NNN | The Mutants | 6 |
| UUU | The Time Warrior | 4 |
| OOO | The Time Monster | 6 |
| TTT | The Green Death | 6 |
| XXX | Death to the Daleks | 4 |
| YYY | The Monster of Peladon | 6 |
| ZZZ | Planet of the Spiders | 6 |
TVO therefore bought parts of GROUPs B, C, D and all of E of the Jon Pertwee stories, in three separate packages: the first six were purchased by March 1976, OOO and XXX by February 1977, and TTT, YYY and ZZZ by September 1977).
The programme was supplied as NTSC colour video tapes with English soundtracks.
Some of these stories also aired on these stations around the same time:
They also later aired on:
Origin of the Tapes?
The sale would have been completed by the BBC's office in Toronto, but the NTSC tapes for the season 7, 8 and 9 stories were supplied to BBC Toronto via Time Life Films / Television, who were the BBC's distribution agents in America, whilst the season 10 and 11 serials would have been supplied by the BBC directly. (Either the BBC in London converted them from PAL to NTSC or that process was done in Toronto.)
It appears highly likely that BBC Toronto was provided with the original PAL to NTSC masters (or at least whatever still existed) of the original 13 story / 72 episode set that Time Life had.
Indeed, the recovered tape cassette of The Curse of Peladon part three (see below) had a distributor's label on it that said HBO STUDIOS TIME/LIFE TELEVISION, which proves it had originated from the US distributor.
BBC Toronto would have duped copies for CKVU. Since Doctor Who and the Silurians, The Ambassadors of Death, The Mind of Evil and The Daemons were not sold to CKVU or TVO, it's likely those NTSC master tapes no longer existed (and the only copies of them still in circulation within the States were poor quality presentation dupes?)
Interestingly, seasons 10 and 11 were also sold to Boston's WGBX in 1977, which means that the NTSC conversions of the last six stories in the above table were done specifically for the sales to Canada and the United States, presumably as some sort of shared co-deal. (The sale to WGBX was not done through Time Life; it would have been a special one-off deal between WGBX and the BBC.)
Of note, The Three Doctors and The Green Death were of the only ones from that season that BBC London still had in full PAL colour at that time. (Frontier in Space, Planet of the Daleks and Invasion of the Dinosaurs would not have been supplied because by 1976 there were already episodes missing.)
It's not clear why Carnival of Monsters was not part of the package sold to CKVU and TVO, since the serial was sold to WGBX in 1977.
One possible answer is that TVO may have been in negotiations with the BBC to buy the Tom Baker stories much earlier, but the BBC may not have been in a position to do NTSC conversions straight away, and so offered the Pertwees as a compromise while the conversions were being arranged. But their fall schedule only had room for 26 episodes hence the strange selection of cross-season serials that aired 1976 to 1977. CKVU was presumably only able to buy the same "random" package.
When the sale of the Tom Bakers to the United States was signed off in late 1977 / early 1978, and conversion of the Bakers commenced, TVO was offered the same package, but since the tapes wouldn't be ready until the 1978 fall season, TVO bought a second run of Pertwees as a lead-in, but with only 28 airdates available, they had to skip one of the 4-parters; it would have been a choice between Carnival of Monsters and Death to the Daleks, and it was logical to drop the former since the latter featured Sarah Jane Smith who then carried on into the upcoming Tom Baker series…
CKVU did not take up the offer for the Tom Baker serials, but did take up the same Pertwee stories offered to TVO.
Dr Jim Dator
As part of its charter, TVO filmed educational commentaries from Dr Jim Dator, whose five minute segments ran before each episode, and in which he discussed scientific and philosophical aspects presented within the forth-coming episode.
For instance, for Day of the Daleks part four, Dator discussed the nature of time paradoxes. And for The Curse of Peladon, there was discussion about whether or not extraterrestrial life could exist through evolutionary development. For part four of that serial, he spoke about the importance of holding onto and preserving tradition.
| Dr. Jim Dator | ||
|---|---|---|
| Day of the Daleks 4 | audio | |
| The Curse of Peladon 1? | audio | |
| The Curse of Peladon 4 | audio | |
| The Monster of Peladon 6 | YouTube | |
| Planet of the Spiders 3 | Daily Motion | |
| Planet of the Spiders 6 | Daily Motion | |
- For more on Dr Dator, see also:
DOCTOR WHO Resource Handbook
As a supplement to the Jim Dator introductions, the OECA published a DOCTOR WHO RESOURCE HANDBOOK in 1976. The eight-page document featured a brief background to the series, a short episode guide to the six stories in the 1976/77 run (which referred to Day of the Daleks as "Dr Who and the Daleks"), and listed the themes and subjects that Dator would be discussing ahead of each episode. The document also provided a list of recommended SF-themed books and periodicals.
Of particular note is that the serials were listed in the same odd order they were broadcast.
Transmission
After an eleven year gap, Doctor Who returned to Canada, skipping the entire Patrick Troughton era, and starting with Jon Pertwee.
From 18 September 1976, CKVU in Vancouver commenced screenings of Doctor Who. The same day, but in a later timeslot, Doctor Who also aired in Ontario.
The Three Doctors – guest-starring Patrick Troughton! – commenced the TVO run, from Saturday, 18 September 1976, at 7.30pm. The series screened for 26 episodes and aired without break until 12 March 1977, with The Time Warrior part four.
For reasons unknown, the order in which the six serials aired did not reflect the correct BBC order.
Six months later, a second run of 28 episodes commenced on Saturday, 17 September 1977, again at 7.30pm. The first story was The Time Monster.
The second story was The Green Death; this was the first time the serial had screened in the Commonwealth since its original UK broadcasts in 1974. (It had been "rejected" in Australia in 1973, and unable to be screened elsewhere by the few Commonwealth countries still buying the series at that time. It wasn't until 1978 that The Green Death aired in Australia.)
During the first run of Tom Baker stories, The Three Doctors, Day of the Daleks, and The Curse of Peladon were repeated on Thursdays, from 5 April 1979 to 21 June 1979, then after a six week break, The Mutants from 9 August to 13 September 1979, all at 7.00pm. Unlike the previous, and as would become the norm in later years, there was no corresponding Saturday broadcast of these episodes.
Episodes from the 1977/1978 run (but not Planet of the Spiders) were also repeated, from 15 March 1980 through until 14 August 1980. Each episode aired on Saturday at 7.30pm, and repeated on the following Thursday at 7.00pm.
Fate of the Tapes
A number of the NTSC colour video tapes of Pertwee stories that had screened across Canada in the late 1970s, were found and returned to the BBC, replacing many episodes that the BBC only had on black and white 16mm film:
By April 1981, TVO had returned to the BBC the NTSC colour video tapes of:
Part three of The Curse of Peladon was in a very bad state, and required a lot of clean-up work by the BBC to make it playable.
.
TOM BAKER
38 stories, 160 episodes purchased:
| 4A | Robot | 4 |
| 4C | The Ark in Space | 4 |
| 4B | The Sontaran Experiment | 2 |
| 4E | Genesis of the Daleks | 6 |
| 4D | Revenge of the Cybermen | 4 |
| 4F | Terror of the Zygons | 4 |
| 4G | Pyramids of Mars | 4 |
| 4H | Planet of Evil | 4 |
| 4J | The Android Invasion | 4 |
| 4K | The Brain of Morbius | 4 |
| 4L | The Seeds of Doom | 6 |
| 4M | The Masque of Mandragora | 4 |
| 4N | The Hand of Fear | 4 |
| 4P | The Deadly Assassin | 4 |
| 4Q | The Face of Evil | 4 |
| 4R | The Robots of Death | 4 |
| 4S | The Talons of Weng-Chiang(*) | 6 |
| 4V | Horror of Fang Rock | 4 |
| 4T | The Invisible Enemy | 4 |
| 4Z | The Invasion of Time | 6 |
| 5A | The Ribos Operation | 4 |
| 5B | The Pirate Planet | 4 |
| 5C | The Stones of Blood | 4 |
| 5D | The Androids of Tara | 4 |
| 5E | The Power of Kroll | 4 |
| 5F | The Armageddon Factor | 6 |
| 5G | The Creature from the Pit | 4 |
| 5J | Destiny of the Daleks | 4 |
| 5H | City of Death | 4 |
| 5K | Nightmare of Eden | 4 |
| 5L | The Horns of Nimon | 4 |
| 5N | The Leisure Hive | 4 |
| 5Q | Meglos | 4 |
| 5R | Full Circle | 4 |
| 5P | State of Decay | 4 |
| 5S | Warriors' Gate | 4 |
| 5T | The Keeper of Traken | 4 |
| 5V | Logopolis | 4 |
TVO therefore bought all bar three of the Tom Baker stories.
The programme was supplied as NTSC colour video tapes with English soundtracks.
The serials were purchased in "packages" of 24, 26 or 28 episodes, hence some seasons were "split".
(*) The Talons of Weng-Chiang had been purchased but was pulled from its scheduled December 1980 screening following claims that it was "dangerous, offensive, racist stereotyping of people of Chinese origin". That the serial had been dropped was reported in the 6 November 1980 issue of the Toronto Star.
Three stories from season 15 were not purchased: Image of the Fendahl, The Sun Makers and Underworld. Why this was is unknown. One possible explanation is that as had been the case with the two runs of Pertwees (see above), the schedule only had 26 available weeks (this was after Talons had already been dropped), meaning that 12 episodes had to be missed.
These episodes later aired on:
Transmission
The Tom Baker era commenced on Saturday, 16 September 1978, at 7.30pm. All episodes were repeated the following Thursday, at 7.00pm.
Dr Judith Merril
The episodes were presented by Dr Judith Merril, who – as "The UnDoctor" – talked about the philosophical concepts explored within the series.
| The UnDoctor | ||
|---|---|---|
| Robot 4 | YouTube | |
| Revenge of the Cybermen 3 | YouTube | |
| Terror of the Zygons | Daily Motion | |
| The Android Invasion | audio | |
| The Masque of Mandragora 4 | YouTube | |
| The Face of Evil 1 | YouTube | |
Seven serials aired in this first 28 episode block; the run concluded with the repeat of part four of Pyramids of Mars on 29 March 1979.
(The following week, and through until 13 September, several Jon Pertwee stories were repeated.)
On 15 September 1979, the series returned with Planet of Evil. Again, episodes aired on Saturdays at 7.30pm, with a repeat on Thursday at 7.00pm. The 26 week run ended on Thursday, 13 March 1980, with the repeat of part four of The Hand of Fear.
(From 15 March 1980 through to 11 September 1980 (on Saturdays and Thursdays) repeats of the Jon Pertwee episodes from the 1977/78 run, with the exception of Planet of the Spiders. The repeat run concluded with a re-run of Robot.) – See CLIP:
A run of new episodes commenced that weekend, with part one of The Deadly Assassin on Saturday, 13 September 1980. The usual Saturday / Thursday repeat cycle continued until 29 January 1981, when the series took a break for two weeks. The run resumed on 14 February 1981 with part one of The Invasion of Time. As noted earlier, The Talons of Weng-Chiang and three serials from season 15 were skipped over. This run also saw the end of Judith Merril's commentaries.
This run ended on 26 March 1981, and was followed by more repeats, which included Robot (for a second repeat), and ended with Terror of the Zygons.
The Doctor and Romana's search for the Key To Time commenced on Saturday, 12 September 1981, and concluded on 11 March 1982. As before, episodes aired Saturdays and repeated Thursdays.
More repeats followed, from March to September 1982: with (Planet of Evil to The Hand of Fear (but skipping Pyramids of Mars).
At some point during this repeat run, TVO showed the Peter Cushing movie Dr Who and the Daleks, split into three half-hour instalments, as part of its classic movie programme Magic Shadows that was regularly shown weeknights at 7.30pm. This meant that viewers got two instalments of Doctor Who one Thursday night!
The new fall TV season began in September 1982; Doctor Who returned in its usual Saturday / Thursday timeslots on 11 September 1982; these season 17 stories aired out of sequence, with The Creature from the Pit, Destiny of the Daleks and City of Death playing in that order. This run concluded with The Leisure Hive part four, repeated on Thursday, 24 February 1983.
- An on-screen trailer for The Leisure Hive Part Three repeat 17 February 1983 can be seen here:
- CLIP: TVO PROMO 1983:
The Key to Time episodes and Destiny of the Daleks were repeated in the usual March to September repeat season.
Meglos opened the new fall season, from 24 September 1983. Tom Baker's reign as the Doctor came to an end on 8 March 1983 when Logopolis part four was re-run.
However, this was not the final end to Baker, as the viewers saw some of his earlier episodes from March through to September 1984, when City of Death to Full Circle were repeated. And from March to September 1985, another re-run of Meglos and Full Circle, followed by the remaining four serials from Baker's final season.
The Baker episodes also aired on:
Omnibus Editions?
In DWM issue #114 (July 1986), Gavin Campbell from Canada wrote that his TV station (or the Canadian distributor) had been retitling the stories: a compilation of The Sontaran Experiment became "The Hunter", The Hand of Fear became "Eldrad Must Live", and even more confusingly, The Sun Makers became "The Underworld".
We can be certain that Campbell was not watching TVO, since all stories aired episodically and not as omnibus editions. The Hand of Fear last aired in Canada in 1982, and The Sun Makers was never screened by TVO. If there is any truth in Campbell's claim, then it's far more likely that these retitled compilations were coming from one of the many US PBS stations that could be received by Canadians living close to the US border. (It's possible that Campbell saw these other "titles" in printed TV listings rather than something that was shown on-screen; were these simply snappy plot descriptions or synopses which he misread as being titles?)
French Broadcasts
In 1987, TVO launched La Chaîne Française, which broadcast French-language programming. From 30 September 1990, the station screened a run of Doctor Who stories using the tapes that had originally been dubbed into French by TF1, which had an abbreviated run of "Le Docteur Who" in 1989 – see France.
- A clip from the French dubbed version La Genèse du Daleks can be seen here:
.
.
PETER DAVISON
19 stories, equivalent of 70 half-hour episodes:
| 5Z | Castrovalva | 4 |
| 5W | Four to Doomsday | 4 |
| 5Y | Kinda | 4 |
| 5X | The Visitation | 4 |
| 6A | Black Orchid | 2 |
| 6B | Earthshock | 4 |
| 6C | Time-Flight | 4 |
| 6D | Snakedance | 4 |
| 6E | Arc of Infinity | 4 |
| 6F | Mawdryn Undead | 4 |
| 6G | Terminus | 4 |
| 6H | Enlightenment | 4 |
| 6J | The King's Demons | 2 |
| 6L | Warriors of the Deep | 4 |
| 6M | The Awakening | 2 |
| 6N | Frontios | 4 |
| 6P | Resurrection of the Daleks | (2/4) |
| 6Q | Planet of Fire | 4 |
| 6R | The Caves of Androzani | 4 |
TVO therefore bought all of the Peter Davison stories, except for The Five Doctors.
The programme was supplied as NTSC colour video tapes with English soundtracks.
Transmission
Peter Davison's first serial, Castrovalva commenced from Saturday, 22 September 1984. After Time-Flight part four's repeat on 21 March 1985, Tom Baker returned in a run of repeats, with another re-run of Meglos and Full Circle, followed by the remaining four serials from Baker's final season.
The Saturday episodes now screened at 7.00pm rather than 7.30pm.
The 20th season of Doctor Who commenced on 7 September 1985, with Snakedance and Arc of Infinity airing out of sequence. The run concluded with Warriors of the Deep in March 1986. (The Five Doctors did not air on TVO.)
- An on-screen trailer for Warriors of the Deep from February 1986 – narrated by John Delazzer - can be seen here:
- CLIP: TVO PROMO 1986:
Re-runs of Four to Doomsday through to Mawdryn Undead filled the usual March to September repeat cycle.
The series returned on 1 November 1986, two months later than its usual September start, in which the final run of Davison episodes, The Awakening to The Caves of Androzani, screened. Resurrection of the Daleks aired as a four-parter. The first two Colin Baker stories aired after The Caves of Androzani.
- A TVO Pledge during The Awakening from November 1986 (clip incorrectly dated as 1985) – narrated by John Delazzer - can be seen here:
- CLIP: TVO PLEDGE:
Repeats of Davison stories, Snakedance, then Terminus to The Awakening (but not The Five Doctors) aired March to September 1987; and Frontios to The Caves of Androzani in 1988.
These episodes also aired on:
.
.
COLIN BAKER
Eight stories, equivalent of 44 half-hour episodes:
| 6S | The Twin Dilemma | 4 |
| 6T | Attack of the Cybermen | 2/4 |
| 6V | Vengeance on Varos | 2/4 |
| 6W | The Two Doctors | 3/6 |
| 6X | The Mark of the Rani | 2/4 |
| 6Y | Timelash | 2/4 |
| 6Z | Revelation of the Daleks | 2/4 |
| 7A | The Trial of a Time Lord | 14 |
TVO therefore bought all of the Colin Baker stories. The longer 45-minute episodes had been re-edited as half hours by the BBC.
The programme was supplied as NTSC colour video tapes with English soundtracks.
It was during this run of Baker episodes that the Canadian distributor for BBC programmes changed from Lionheart to Cinar Films.
Transmission
Immediately after The Caves of Androzani part four, the first two Colin Baker serials aired: The Twin Dilemma from Saturday, 7 March 1987, and Attack of the Cybermen from 4 April 1987, with the usual Thursday repeats.
After a repeat run of season 20 and 21 Davisons, the rest of Colin Baker's first season screened: the run commenced 19 September 1987 and ended with the 18 February 1988 repeat of Revelation of the Daleks.
Four Davison serials from season 21, and the first three Colin Baker serials, were repeated from February to September 1988.
The 14-part epic, The Trial of a Time Lord, aired from Saturday, 1 October 1988 to Thursday, 5 January 1988.
- This TVO PLEDGE drive from December 1988, contains a brief clip from The Trial of a Time Lord at 0:40:
- CLIP: TVO PLEDGE:
There were repeats of The Two Doctors to Revelation of the Daleks from April to July 1989.
In mid-1991, in order to use up their repeat rights, TVO replayed The Trial of a Time Lord on Thursday nights at 10.00pm. We've not been able to confirm the exact start date, but part 13 aired on 29 August 1991. The series was packaged together with old Flash Gordon serials from the 1930s.
These episodes also aired on:
.
.
SYLVESTER McCOY
Four stories, 14 episodes:
| 7D | Time and the Rani | 4 |
| 7E | Paradise Towers | 4 |
| 7F | Delta and the Bannermen | 3 |
| 7G | Dragonfire | 3 |
TVO therefore bought the first season of the Sylvester McCoy stories.
The programme was supplied as NTSC colour video tapes with English soundtracks.
Transmission
The weekend after the Thursday repeat of Colin Baker's final episode, Sylvester McCoy appeared as the Doctor. This run of 14 episodes started 7 January 1989 and ended with the Dragonfire part three repeat on 13 April 1989.
Following a run of Colin Baker re-runs, Time and the Rani and Dragonfire were also repeated on Saturdays and Thursdays. This re-run cycle concluded on Thursday, 7 September 1989.
TVO lost its rights to Doctor Who in July 1989. The re-run of Dragonfire part three on 7 September 1989 was - after an eleven year run of virtually non-stop screenings and repeats – the final regular episode of Doctor Who to air on TVO...
During the summer of 1991, presumably soon after the June 1991 repeat of The Trial of a Time Lord, TVO repeated some of McCoy's stories in order to use up their repeats rights. It is likely this run included Paradise Towers and Delta and the Bannermen, as they had not aired for a third and fourth time alongside the rest of season 24 in 1989.
These episodes also aired on:
Repeats Summary
- The majority of stories were screened by TVO four times – 1) first screening; 2) Thursday repeat; 3) Saturday repeat; 4) Second Thursday repeat
- Three stories screened only once: The Claws of Axos, The Time Warrior, Planet of the Spiders
- Twelve stories aired only twice: Day of the Daleks, The Curse of Peladon, The Mutants, The Three Doctors, Pyramids of Mars, The Deadly Assassin, The Face of Evil, The Robots of Death, Horror of Fang Rock, The Invisible Enemy, The Invasion of Time, Castrovalva,
- Seven stories screened three times: The Time Monster, The Green Death, Death to the Daleks, The Monster of Peladon, The Trial of a Time Lord, Paradise Towers, Delta and the Bannermen
- Four stories aired six times: Robot, Meglos, Full Circle, Snakedance
- Ignoring the Pertwees that were unavailable, five stories did not screen: The Talons of Weng-Chiang, Image of the Fendahl, The Sun Makers, Underworld, The Five Doctors
TV listings
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← AIRDATES ...... (CLICK ICON TO GO TO TABLE SHOWING EPISODE BREAKDOWN AND AIRDATES - N/S = story title is Not Stated) |
Listings for TVO have been obtained from the Toronto Daily Star; other airdates and broadcast information has been provided by Michael J Doran, Ed Conroy, Alex Frazer-Harrison, Graeme Burk and Doug Orlowski, with our thanks.
KEY:
- Story titles in BOLD ITALICISED CAPITALS are first screenings.
- Story titles in PLAIN CAPITALS are "Thursday Repeats".
- Story titles in standard Title Case are general repeats.
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