“The Infinite Quest” is an animated adventure that is part of the new “Doctor Who” series, where it fits in its third season, aired in 2007. It’s written by Alan Barnes and directed by Gary Russell.

The story

The Tenth Doctor (David Tennant) and Martha Jones (Freema Agyeman) intervene to save the Earth from Baltazar, a space pirate who wants to compress the earthlings to obtain diamonds from the carbon in their bodies. The Doctor manages to destroy Baltazar’s ship, the pirate is taken away by his metal bird Caw will but later gets locked up in prison on the ice planet Volag-Noc.

Some time later, the Doctor discovers from Caw that Baltazar has been released and is looking for the Infinite, a mythical starship that can grant people their heart’s desire. Caw gives the Doctor a copy of a data chip that allows to reach up to the next one for a total of four chips and at the end it’s possible to obtain the coordinates of the Infinite. The Doctor and Martha must find the next chips before Baltazar.

Extras

This DVD contains a fair amount of extras though they’re short.

Interviews. Interviews with actors David Tennant, Freema Agyeman, Anthony Head, Toby Longworth and director Gary Russell.

The voice artists. A behind the scenes of the recording of this adventure with the actors.

Dialogue Recording. The recording of two mini-episodes that make up this adventure.

Animation tests with David Tennant. Some animation tests, especially of the Doctor.

Animation studio. A behind the scenes with the artists who animated this adventure.

Animatics & deleted scenes. Sketches for some scenes of this adventure and some deleted scenes with the audio recording accompanied by sketches.

In the past some animated webcasts were already produced but in 2007 an animated adventure was produced for television split into 13 mini-episodes. 12 episodes lasting about three and a half minutes each aired as part of children TV show “Totally Doctor Who”, later the whole adventure was broadcast in its entirety including the final part still unaired.

The first mini-episode was broadcast two days after the regular series episode “Smith and Jones”, which is Martha Jones debut. The adventure was broadcast entirely on the same day of the regular series episode “Last of the Time Lords”, the season three finale.

“The Infinite Quest” plot reminds some classic adventures with the difference that this time the Doctor goes in search of data chips instead of keys like in the adventure “The Keys of Marinus” or parts of a single key like in the adventures of the season known as “The Key to Time“.

Those classic adventures however had a duration adequate to have a good  plot development while in “The Infinite Quest” The Doctor and Martha are quickly moving from place to place so at each stage the situation must be resolved quickly.

“Doctor Who” is now rarely a program for kids but even “The Keys of Marinus”, which is an adventure of the first season of the classic series, has a more sophisticated plot than “The Infinite Quest”. The program “Totally Doctor Who” in which the mini-episodes that make up this animated adventure were broadcast was produced to bring younger audiences to the new “Doctor Who” series. For this reason and to make it easier to follow the plot through several mini-episodes, inevitably the story is simple and divided into small blocks.

The consequence is that in “The Infinite Quest” the space is high and this is positive because watching it all at once the episode flows smoothly from the beginning to the end. David Tennant’s verve however helps to give some substance to the Doctor and Martha’s long journey as well as Anthony Head, who plays Baltazar, who is another positive element of this adventure.

Obviously, the cartoon can easily have robots and non-humanoid characters. However, you can see that the quality level of the animation is that of a budget television production, not that of a movie. The characters expressions are limited, luckily the voice performances are good.

When the DVD is put into the player the first thing that appears is the “Children’s DVD” message and that clarifies, if it were still needed, what is the target. Overall, it’s a nice episode in a DVD that contains limited extra so it’s a product you may want to buy to introduce some children to “Doctor Who” or for fans who want the complete collection of DVDs.