The Burial of the Dead

By the time The Curse of Fenric was transmitted, Doctor Who’s immediate fate was already sealed. Sealed like a tomb. Or in a flask. There would be no new television Doctor Who in at least the financial years 1990/91 or 1991/92. Not that that was something that anyone was prepared to admit to in public at an event which, in retrospect, looks like a reluctant wake.

At a belated launch for the last two stories of the 1989 season of Doctor Who, held just before The Curse of Fenric Part One was shown, BBC Head of Drama Series Peter Cregeen - the man who had wielded the axe - insisted to the press that “Doctor Who has been on for twenty six years and I see no reason that it shouldn’t continue”.