Marco Polo is unique amongst the stories currently missing from BBC archives. It is the only Season One story with no episodes in existance, telesnaps are not known to exist for the story, and many b/w and colour photopraphs exist for this story, making the story a prime candidate for reconstruction out of all the non-telesnap missing stories.

For this reconstruction, the Loose Cannon team have chosen to present the story in colour, due to the number of colour photographs that exist for the story. This has meant a lot of hard work colourising the black and white photos, which more than pays off. Loose Cannon also colourised the Hartnell title sequence, and cliffhanger footage from The Brink of Disaster. For some sequences, such as Marco Polo making his journal entries, specially created stills are used to great effect, filling out the moments for which there is no material to be found in the many photos that exist for Marco Polo.

The tape starts with an introduction from Mark Eden about the story. Following this, acting as a prologue and epilogue to the reconstruction, Mark is back in character as an elderly Marco Polo, reflecting on his encounter with the TARDIS crew. These bookends are well written, and are an inventive way to lead into and round out the Marco Polo reconstruction.

Next on the tape is a mini-documentary looking at the life of Marco Polo, narrated by Mark Eden. The final item on the tape is a documentary researched, written, produced and narrated by Richard Bignell, looking at the production of Marco Polo. Both documentaries are worth watching, for more information on Marco Polo the man, and Marco Polo the Doctor Who story.

I can thoroughly recommend this reconstruction, due to the extensive work involved in putting together the reconstruction itself, and the extra features which top and tail the reconstruction. Finally, if you don't like the idea of a black and white Doctor Who story being presented in colour, as Mark Eden says in his introduction, you can always turn down the colour on your TV.

10/10