The Time Warrior
Attentive readers of this newsletter, assuming it has any, will have been expecting Genesis of the Daleks next. It was, after all, on the same tape as last...
The Sontaran Experiment
“Experiment - make it your motto day and night. Experiment - and it will lead you to the light.” At the end of 1989, and with exquisite timing, I went to my...
"Memories are made of this."
“A man is the sum of his memories, you know. A Time Lord even more so.” But not my memories. The second of our short series of pieces about the most recent...
Ncuti Doc Thing
To start with this week, here’s a time capsule; something I wrote for The Guardian back when Ncuti Gatwa‘s casting as the New Doctor Who was announced. Some...
Survival
“Cat People. Putting out the fire.” Doctor Who fandom has long done easy jokes about the final serial of the final twentieth century series of Doctor Who...
"Pain is so close to pleasure. Oh yeah. Sunshine and rainy weather? Go hand-in-hand together, all your life."
A guest post this week, from the brilliant Graeme Burk, whose remarkable Sydney Newman book can be bought here and also at less evil places. Jim’s Psychic...
The Ark in Space
“I’m forever blowing bubbles.” Someone with whom I used to work in the decade or so that I dwelled within an often cold and sterile corporate ecosystem had a...
The Ultimate Adventure
“Business is business. We always aim to please.” As the 1980s came to a close theatre impresario Mark Furness was enjoying success with his stage version of...
Nemesis of the Daleks
Printed in for four monthly episodes from August to November 1989, Nemesis of the Daleks (reprint available here) was the sole Doctor Who Magazine comic...
Ghost Light
“The monkey house is nearly full, but there’s room enough for you.” It’s the twentieth anniversary of the return of Doctor Who this week. Twenty years since...
"Names that will live forever."
We have a guest post this week, from writer Jonathan Morris, whose diverse credits in many media include Doctor Who audios, books and comic strips - but also...
Battlefield
“We’re knights of the round table, we dance whene'er we're able. We do routines and chorus scenes, with footwork imp-ecc-able.” Battlefield is a serial that...
The Talons of Weng-Chiang
“I’ve got the real Limehouse Blues… Rings on your fingers and tears for your crown. This is a story of the old Chinatown.” In early 1989, in a post twenty-...
"Is it just me that's taking the mick? Or are other people waiting for it?"
Doctor Who fans don’t, on the whole, much like our show being parodied. For those of a certain age or or beyond, it probably conjures memories of playground...
Death Flower!
Death Flower! ran in TV Comic #1204 - #1214 in early 1975. With #1204 being published the same day as Part Two of Robot was transmitted, it also served as...
“I'm going through changes."
“My friends just can't understand this new me.” Watching Spearhead from Space at the BFI earlier this month two paradoxical things struck me. The first was...
Terror of the Zygons
“Eighteen months is too long to wait.” Terror of the Zygons (1975) and The Talons of Weng-Chiang (1977) came out on VHS towards the end of 1988, having been...
Spearhead from Space @ the BFI Special (RPT)
This is a very lightly edited version of a piece I wrote 18 months ago, when Spearhead from Space was screen at the BFI as part of the “Film on Film” season....
“N n n n n Nineteen”
Season by Season Doctor Who had started the 1970s with a clean break. A new regular cast, a new format and the series in colour for the first time. The...
"I'm in pieces, bits and pieces."
I’ve been luxuriating in “The War Games in Colour” a bit since Christmas. A favourite story in a new edition, skilfully cut down to TVM length, and coloured...
