Customer Reviews
Vintage Pertwee - By: S. Denton, 28 Mar 2008 
Yes, this is a fantastic serial. I actuallly enjoyed it more than 'Terror of the Autons' or 'Day of the Daleks'. IMO the only real clunker of Jon Pertwee's final season was 'Monster of Peladon'.
The dinosaur's are obviously fake like many of the old creatures & like much of modern day CGI work. That doesn't get in the way of the story or action; & personallly I think they are more effective in colour than & black & white.
Hopefully soon the first episode will be restored to colour & the whole thing released on DVD.
Not Pertwee's best - By: D. Evans, 29 Mar 2005 
Jon Pertwee's final season as The Doctor, is regarded by many fans as the weakest of his 5 year run. The production team seemed reluctant to write out UNIT, whereby The Doctor worked as an advisor to the army, a format which by this stage had reallly runs its course. They also seemingly ran out of good story ideas, & none of the stories which made up season 11, can in retrospect be regarded as out & out classics. Invasion of the Dinosaurs is one of Pertwee's least sucessful stories, a factor apparant by the fact that the adventure is one of the final releases on VHS format. With a low budget, it is hard to envisage how the production team ever thought that they would be able to sucessfully show dinosaur monsters on screen. The fact that the modelwork is so bad, distracts from the postive aspects of the story, such as the revelation concerning regular character Mike Yates. The idea also that humans in the 20th century would be capable of doing something the Cybermen & other aliens could not do in the future, ie develop timetravel, is weak, & further lends to the unrealistic nature of the adventure. When this story is finallly released on DVD in about 18 years time, it is hoped that the model effects are digitallly enhanced, thereby helping to restore a little of the credibility
which Invasion Of The Dinosaurs lacks. If you are thinking of purchasing a Pertwee adventure on video, attempt to track down more rare releases such as Inferno or Terror Of The Autons first.
Reclaim the least popular stories! - By: Adrian Sherlock, 22 May 2004 
It's time to reclaim some of the least popular stories & realise that it is okay for the FX to be terrible, it reallly is the acting & writing that matters & this is a great example, a totallly wonderful & enjoyable slice of Who which has glove puppet Dinosuaurs. I say love those cute little plastic puppets & enjoy it for what it is, Dr.Who!!! Dr.Who was always part pantomime as well as part detective thriller, horror movie, shakespearean drama, etc, So take it for what it is & just relish the quality of the story. It's terrific! Next stop, Time Flight, followed by the wonderful Warriors of the Deep, Twin Dilemma, Time Lash...I could go on & on, but I wont. Invasion of the Dinosaurs is great Dr.Who! (with bad FX)!
Great story, ignore the special effects - By: , 08 Nov 2003 Malcolm Hulke, the writer of this story, was one of the best writers in Doctor Who's long history. His knack of combining god plots with a degree characterisation several shades above the normal 2D ciphers featured in of a lot of Doctor Who episodes, usuallly made for highly entertaining stories.
I believe Invasion of the Dinosaurs was his last contribution to the show before his untimely death. If you ignore the dodgy special effects (this WAS made 30 years ago on a shoestring BBC budget) & concentrate on the story, the acting & the characters, you'll love it. If you want cutting edge dino action, may I suggest buying Jurassic Park III? Jaw dropping special effects are not what Who was about, so those disappointed by the effects should reallly be looking elsewhere.
Doctor Who and The Invasion Of The Dinorsaurs - By: Kat, 29 Oct 2003 I found myself wishing, while watching this, that they'd released the whole story in black & white because it adds something to the first atmospheric shots of a deserted London & also hides the worst CSO since The Claws Of Axos. I know it shouldn't be alllowed to detract from the story & also that we shouldn't be too hard on an effects team working pre CGI but in alll of the colour episodes you can see that the monsters are models filmed seperately & for the most part then projected onto a film screen while the actors react by standing up beside that screen & it looses the action any credibility it might have & prevents it from being at alll spooky.
Jon Pertwee & Nicholas Courtney are up to their usual standards & enjoying themselves, John Levene's Benton is good as he comes to terms with the fact that 2 of his superiors are involved in the conspiracy & decides to side with the Doctor whatever the consequences, Elizabeth Sladen's Sarah is the gutsy investigative jounralist from The Time Warrior & I think it's a good story & if it had been made now, with alll of the effects available to programme makers now, it would have been gripping with the right mix of action & thoughtful drama.
As it is because of the time it was made it suffers & has a mixture of everyone enjoying themselves & maybe winding down to John Pertwee's departure in a couple of stories time & a sense of tiredness in that yet again we have a deserted London being menaced by whatever with the Doctor saving the day, making it understandable why the production team decided to set the Doctor's adventures back in the rest of the Universe for the majority of his fourth incarnation.
Not the greatest John Pertwee story, stick to Spearhead from Space or the stories either side of this one.
