This one was actually a re-watch. I've seen three of the Reeltime Pictures films, this being one, but with DW off the air atm I figured I would revisit these and then also watch the ones I haven't seen.

I think it's fine. The idea of Benton getting haunted by the ghosts of his past in what seems to be his childhood home is a good one, and some of it really works. The subplot with the gunmen trying to steal U.N.I.T. weapons less so, but it's literally visualized as time moving slow on the outside while inside Benton's mind bubble things are moving along normally so that Benton can deal with this and get back to save the day.

At least it's a short watch at roughly 30 minutes. What I love most about this movie though is the music. Mark Ayres' soundtrack is 🤌🏻.

Wartime proposes quite an interesting concept, one which deals with grief. However, between the wooden acting and lack of explanations behind literally anything going on it becomes quite hard to follow. That said, I did find myself relatively invested due to the fact its Benton and we're learning about his backstory.

The best way I can think to describe Wartime is as extremely strange. The plot, while definitely deliberately confusing, isn't really coherent or clear enough (was it ever explained why Benton was seeing flashbacks from his past, or who the armed villain(s) were?). The editing is extremely weird throughout, with odd cuts and overlaid images. I also found some of the acting to be a bit wooden. Overall, why I enjoyed watching this a bit, that was because it reached the point of being so bad that it was a bit funny.

I watched this just following season 23 of the main show, as this was released in early 1987.

With the overly long “cinematic” title and credit sequences, it's impossible to get into a natural rhythm whilst watching this fan production. As critical as I am of Eric Saward and JNT’s handling of the 6th Doctor’s era I can’t say I wish it had been handled by the well meaning team behind Wartime instead.

I can see what they’re going for, bringing some emotional stakes into the show and foregrounding Sergeant Benton, a character from the show’s glory years, but it’s done with the subtlety of a sledgehammer. As a Doctor Who fan I am happy to ignore the janky 1980s home video effects but the emotional backstory involving Benton’s long lost brother (who has returned as a ghost in a forest) feels underbaked and forced.

You get a bit of a smile from seeing Benton and hearing the Brig over the radio. But they haven’t adapted the character to be an older Benton - he’s just introduced as if he didn’t go away then spends the majority of the running time wandering round a field. There is a distinct lack of dialogue and plot. Literally 10 minutes of walking around, using up screen time. Safe to say this would never be aired on the BBC.

It ends up being a ploddy, mystic mesh of Benton seeing ghosts of his younger self playing with his brother. Whilst they try and trick Benton and he completely loses his marbles… He then has a weird panic induced picnic with his hallucinated mum and dad. Then starts imagining himself as a WWII soldier.

John Levine’s acting is horrible. Especially when playing the emotional scenes with his Dad. “Stop calling me Johnny… my name is JOHN!!!!!!!”

Writer Andy Lane has thankfully gone on to do much better than this for Big Finish.