121-558: Lists of books based on Doctor Who cover different types of book in the Doctor Who media franchise . These include novels , audiobooks , and short story anthologies . The lists are organized by publisher and imprint. The novelisations of TV episodes were published from 1964 onwards by various publishers, including: Novel series published by Virgin Books : Novel series published by BBC Books : Shortly after they acquired
242-516: A "renewal", and the Second Doctor underwent a "change of appearance". The device has allowed for the recasting of the actor various times in the show's history, as well as the depiction of alternative Doctors either from the Doctor's relative past or future. The serials The Deadly Assassin (1976) and Mawdryn Undead (1983) established that a Time Lord can only regenerate 12 times, for
363-455: A 16-year hiatus of in-house production. Eccleston left after one series and was replaced by David Tennant . Davies left the production team in 2009. Steven Moffat , a writer under Davies, was announced as his successor, along with Matt Smith as the new Doctor. Smith decided to leave the role of the Doctor in 2013, the 50th anniversary year. He was replaced by Peter Capaldi . In January 2016, Moffat announced that he would step down after
484-625: A 26-part animated children's series, K-9 , to be written by Bob Baker. The article in The Times also featured a picture of the redesigned K-9 for the animated series. Each episode will be 30 minutes long, made by Jetix Europe and London-based distribution unit Park Entertainment. According to a report in Broadcast magazine, the BBC opted out of involvement in order to focus on Torchwood , meaning that BBC-owned characters are unlikely to appear in
605-503: A Nigerian television relay station in Jos . Six of the eleven films discovered were the six-part serial The Enemy of the World (1968), from which all but the third episode had been missing. The remaining films were from another six-part serial, The Web of Fear (1968), and included the previously missing episodes 2, 4, 5 and 6. Episode 3 of The Web of Fear is still missing. The Doctor
726-488: A challenge to find missing Doctor Who episodes with the promise of a full-scale Dalek model as a reward. In December 2011, it was announced that part 3 of Galaxy 4 (1965) and part 2 of The Underwater Menace (1967) had been returned to the BBC by a fan who had purchased them in the mid-1980s without realising that the BBC did not hold copies of them. On 10 October 2013, the BBC announced that films of eleven episodes, including nine missing episodes, had been found in
847-558: A disembodied brain falling to the floor in The Brain of Morbius and the Doctor apparently being drowned by a villain in The Deadly Assassin (both 1976). Mary Whitehouse's complaint about the latter incident prompted a change in BBC policy towards the series, with much tighter controls imposed on the production team, and the series' next producer, Graham Williams , was under a directive to take out "anything graphic in
968-477: A fate for Ace that differed from later original novels, and Philip Martin 's adaptation of the Mindwarp segment of The Trial of a Time Lord included an ending that completely contradicted the scripted ending of the televised serial. After Virgin began its New Adventures and Missing Adventures line of original novels in 1991, it also published several additional novelisations both on their own and under
1089-472: A guest star during the 2006 season, returned in a different role. A second major spin-off of Doctor Who was The Sarah Jane Adventures , created for a younger audience on CBBC , starring Elisabeth Sladen as the Doctor's former companion Sarah Jane Smith . It began with a 60-minute pilot episode co-written by Davies and Gareth Roberts , premiering on BBC One and the CBBC channel on New Year's Day 2007;
1210-464: A hitherto unknown incarnation of the Doctor known as the War Doctor in the run-up to the show's 50th-anniversary special " The Day of the Doctor ". He is shown in mini-episode " The Night of the Doctor " retroactively inserted into the show's fictional chronology between McGann's and Eccleston's Doctors, although his introduction was written so as not to disturb the established numerical naming of
1331-423: A locally produced non-sporting event) high rating of 2.4 million viewers. The first series (Oct '06 – Jan '07) comprised 13 episodes broadcast on BBC Three, and was followed by a second 13-part series (Jan '08 – Apr '08) broadcast on BBC Two. A third series was written as a five-part mini-series titled Torchwood: Children of Earth , airing on five consecutive nights from to 10 July 2009 on BBC One. A fourth series
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#17327795416171452-501: A lot of choice—we only had the Dalek serial to go ... We had a bit of a crisis of confidence because Donald [Wilson] was so adamant that we shouldn't make it. Had we had anything else ready we would have made that." Nation's script became the second Doctor Who serial – The Daleks (also known as The Mutants ). The serial introduced the eponymous aliens that would become the series' most popular monsters, dubbed "Dalekmania", and
1573-539: A more compassionate figure and was eventually revealed to be a Time Lord , whose race are from the planet Gallifrey , which the Doctor fled by stealing the TARDIS. Producers introduced the concept of regeneration to permit the recasting of the main character. This was prompted by the poor health of the original star, William Hartnell . The term "regeneration" was not conceived until the Doctor's third on-screen regeneration; Hartnell's Doctor merely described undergoing
1694-756: A national institution in the United Kingdom, with a large following among the general viewing audience. The show received controversy over the suitability of the series for children. Morality campaigner Mary Whitehouse repeatedly complained to the BBC over what she saw as the programme's violent, frightening and gory content. According to Radio Times , the series "never had a more implacable foe than Mary Whitehouse". A BBC audience research survey conducted in 1972 found that, by their own definition of violence ("any act[s] which may cause physical and/or psychological injury, hurt or death to persons, animals or property, whether intentional or accidental"), Doctor Who
1815-648: A poorer place without Doctor Who ". On 4 August 2013, a live programme titled Doctor Who Live: The Next Doctor was broadcast on BBC One, during which the actor who was going to play the Twelfth Doctor was revealed. The live show was watched by an average of 6.27 million in the UK, and was also simulcast in the United States, Canada and Australia. Doctor Who originally ran for 26 seasons on BBC One, from 23 November 1963 until 6 December 1989. During
1936-523: A regular basis, initially based upon the then-current Third Doctor 's episodes, but soon expanding to include all past Doctors as well. The initial three novelisations had been published in various editions both inside and outside the United Kingdom (editions appeared in the Netherlands , Canada and the United States). Further foreign editions of the novelisations appeared from the 1970s, with
2057-428: A series. Licensed media such as novels and audio plays provided new stories , but as a television programme, Doctor Who remained dormant. In September 2003, BBC Television announced the in-house production of a new series, after several years of attempts by BBC Worldwide to find backing for a feature film version. The 2005 revival of Doctor Who is a direct plot continuation of the original 1963–1989 series and
2178-504: A stop. No 1960s episodes exist on their original videotapes (all surviving prints being film transfers), though some were transferred to film for editing before transmission and exist in their broadcast form. Some episodes have been returned to the BBC from the archives of other countries that bought prints for broadcast or by private individuals who acquired them by various means. Early colour videotape recordings made off-air by fans have also been retrieved, as well as excerpts filmed from
2299-404: A time restricted to a maximum page length as they were considered children's literature. Not all Target novelisations faithfully followed the scripts. John Lucarotti 's The Massacre (1987) completely changed the plot of the source serial, The Massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve . Some guide books (notably 1999's A Critical Guide to Doctor Who on Television by Kenneth Muir) describe the plot of
2420-464: A total of 13 incarnations. This line became stuck in the public consciousness despite not often being repeated and was recognised by producers of the show as a plot obstacle for when the show finally had to regenerate the Doctor a thirteenth time. The episode " The Time of the Doctor " (2013) depicted the Doctor acquiring a new cycle of regenerations, starting from the Twelfth Doctor , due to
2541-484: A webcast in 2003) was finally released by BBC Books in 2012, adapted by Gareth Roberts . Adams' scripts for City of Death and The Pirate Planet were novelised by James Goss and published in 2015 and 2017, respectively. In 2018, BBC Books began a line adaptations of episodes from the 21st-century revival of Doctor Who as part of "The Target Collection". The earliest original Doctor Who spin-off fiction appeared in children's annuals from 1964, and over
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#17327795416172662-543: Is a significant part of popular culture in Britain and elsewhere; it has gained a cult following . It has influenced generations of British television professionals, many of whom grew up watching the series. Fans of the series are sometimes referred to as Whovians . The series has been listed in Guinness World Records as the longest-running science-fiction television series in the world, as well as
2783-404: Is and where he came from,". He instead suggested The Sarah Jane Adventures (see above). A further spin-off of Doctor Who — Rose Tyler: Earth Defence , a 90-minute special that could possibly become an annual event—was cancelled by Davies at a late stage of its development. He considered it to be "a spin-off too far", despite the production having been commissioned and budgeted by
2904-546: Is like comparing Monopoly with the property market in London: both are fantasies, but one is meant to be taken seriously." During Jon Pertwee 's second season as the Doctor, in the serial Terror of the Autons (1971), images of murderous plastic dolls, daffodils killing unsuspecting victims, and blank-featured policemen marked the apex of the series' ability to frighten children. Other notable moments in that decade include
3025-429: Is set in modern-day Cardiff and revolves around a team investigating alien activities and crime. The series features John Barrowman , playing former Ninth Doctor companion Jack Harkness , police officer Gwen Cooper , computer expert Toshiko Sato , medic Owen Harper and "support man", Ianto Jones . The first episode aired 22 October 2006 and received a record BBC Three (and all British cable television record for
3146-477: Is that many of the television writers and stars have been directly involved in the production of spin-offs. For example, it has become common for a former television actor to reprise their character for an audio play. The BBC holds no position on Doctor Who canon . Although the spin-offs generally do not intentionally contradict the television series, the various spin-off series do occasionally contradict each other. The first spin-off attempt that actually reached
3267-511: Is the earliest known original long-form prose Doctor Who adventure. Short stories also appeared in other venues such as two anniversary specials produced by the editors of the Radio Times . The first of these (1973) was Terry Nation 's "We Are the Daleks!" while the second (1983) had Eric Saward's "Birth of a Renegade". The former explains the origins of the Daleks and the latter reveals
3388-488: Is the first woman to be cast as the character. The show introduced the Time Lords' ability to change sex on regeneration in earlier episodes, first in dialogue, then with Michelle Gomez 's version of The Master and T'Nia Miller 's version of The General. Upon Whittaker's final appearance as the character in " The Power of the Doctor " on 23 October 2022, she regenerated into a form portrayed by David Tennant , who
3509-654: The Daily Telegraph in 2009, the revival of Doctor Who had consistently received high ratings, both in number of viewers and as measured by the Appreciation Index . In 2007, Caitlin Moran , television reviewer for The Times , wrote that Doctor Who is "quintessential to being British". According to Steven Moffat , the American film director Steven Spielberg has commented that "the world would be
3630-463: The 2017 finale , to be replaced by Chris Chibnall in 2018. Jodie Whittaker , the first female Doctor, appeared in three series, the last of which was shortened due to the COVID-19 pandemic . Both Whittaker and Chibnall announced that they would depart the series after a series of specials in 2022. Davies returned as showrunner from the 60th anniversary specials , twelve years after he had left
3751-496: The BBC Television Service at 17:16:20 GMT on 23 November 1963; this was eighty seconds later than the scheduled programme time, because of announcements concerning the previous day's assassination of John F. Kennedy . It was to be a regular weekly programme, each episode 25 minutes of transmission length. Discussions and plans for the programme had been in progress for a year. The head of drama Sydney Newman
Lists of books based on Doctor Who - Misplaced Pages Continue
3872-538: The Doctor Who DVD releases. In 2011, Confidential was among several shows cancelled by BBC Three to free up space for new programming. Following the success of the first series of the revived Doctor Who , a new spin-off titled Torchwood became the first to be commissioned as a full television series. In contrast to its parent show, Torchwood was initially conceived by creator Russell T Davies as an "adult" programme to be broadcast post- watershed . It
3993-555: The Eleventh Doctor being the product of the Doctor's twelfth regeneration from his original set. Although the idea of casting a woman as the Doctor had been suggested by the show's writers several times, including by Newman in 1986 and Davies in 2008, until 2017, all official depictions were played by men. Jodie Whittaker took over the role as the Thirteenth Doctor at the end of the 2017 Christmas special and
4114-548: The First Doctor transforming into the Second . The only portion of this in existence, barring a few poor-quality silent 8 mm clips, is the few seconds of the regeneration scene, as it was shown on the children's magazine show Blue Peter . With the approval of the BBC, efforts are now underway to restore as many of the episodes as possible from the extant material. "Official" reconstructions have also been released by
4235-472: The Lost Stories series, with actress Jean Marsh reprising the role of Sara. There was some discussion about spinning off the characters of Henry Gordon Jago and Professor George Litefoot from the 1977 serial The Talons of Weng-Chiang into their own series, but this was not taken forward on television (although it has been produced on audio). The concept art for an animated Doctor Who series
4356-520: The Ninth Doctor , Tenth Doctor , Eleventh Doctor and Twelfth Doctor , and a hardback script book containing the shooting scripts for the 2005 series. Scripts for later seasons have not yet been published as of 2018, though 2005–2009 lead writer Russell T Davies has made his scripts available online. In 2007, Penguin Books revived the novelisations concept for the spin-off series, The Sarah Jane Adventures . As of early 2010, all stories from
4477-534: The TARDIS , and ends when the Titanic crashes into the TARDIS. For the 2011 Comic Relief Red Nose Day appeal a two-part story was shown. It starred Matt Smith , Karen Gillan and Arthur Darvill and did not have any guest stars. The first attempt to produce a spin-off television series for Doctor Who occurred in the mid-1960s when Terry Nation attempted to launch a US-produced serialised series focusing on
4598-402: The "classic series" eventually fell behind other science fiction in production values and reputation, leading to its cancellation The BBC drama department produced the programme for 26 seasons, broadcast on BBC One . Due to his increasingly poor health, William Hartnell , first actor to play the Doctor, was succeeded by Patrick Troughton in 1966. In 1970, Jon Pertwee replaced Troughton and
4719-493: The "missing season" but never produced due to the 18-month hiatus in 1985–1986 ( The Nightmare Fair , The Ultimate Evil and Mission to Magnus ), the spin-off K-9 and Company , and even a 1976 children's story record ( The Pescatons ), which has the distinction of being the final Doctor Who book published under the Target imprint. (The Target logo was retained for later reprints and intermittent new titles up to 1994 and
4840-475: The "most successful" science-fiction series of all time, based on its overall broadcast ratings, DVD and book sales. The series originally ran from 1963 to 1989. There was an unsuccessful attempt to revive regular production in 1996 with a backdoor pilot in the form of a television film titled Doctor Who . The series was relaunched in 2005 and was produced in-house by BBC Wales in Cardiff . Since 2023,
4961-477: The 1990s, Marvel Comics commissioned the writers of the various original novels under Virgin's New and Missing Adventures lines (see below) to write short pieces entitled "Preludes" which were run in Doctor Who Magazine . These short stories (never more than one magazine page in length) usually focused on an event just prior to a particular novel, or on a character prior to his or her encounter with
Lists of books based on Doctor Who - Misplaced Pages Continue
5082-602: The 1990s, Virgin Publishing launched a series of Doctor Who -based short story anthologies titled Decalog . A total of five volumes were published, and the last two, Decalog 4 and Decalog 5 were published after Virgin had lost the Doctor Who franchise and did not feature the Doctor. Decalog 4 concentrated on the family of Roz Forrester—a companion introduced in the NAs—over a thousand-year time span. Also during
5203-403: The 1996 television film. The executive producers of the new incarnation of the series were Queer as Folk writer Russell T Davies and BBC Cymru Wales head of drama Julie Gardner . From 2005, the series switched from a multi-camera to a single-camera setup. Starring Christopher Eccleston as the Doctor, Doctor Who returned with the episode "Rose" on BBC One on 26 March 2005, after
5324-414: The 45-minute run time; notably, the episodes " Journey's End " from 2008 and " The Eleventh Hour " from 2010 were longer than an hour. 883 Doctor Who instalments have been televised since 1963, ranging between 25-minute episodes (the most common format for the classic era), 45/50-minute episodes (for Resurrection of the Daleks in the 1984 series, a single season in 1985, and the most common format for
5445-804: The BBC on VHS, on MP3 CD-ROM , and as special features on DVD. The BBC, in conjunction with animation studio Cosgrove Hall , reconstructed the missing episodes 1 and 4 of The Invasion (1968), using remastered audio tracks and the comprehensive stage notes for the original filming, for the serial's DVD release in November 2006. The missing episodes of The Reign of Terror were animated by animation company Theta-Sigma, in collaboration with Big Finish , and became available for purchase in May 2013 through Amazon.com. Subsequent animations made in 2013 include The Tenth Planet , The Ice Warriors (1967) and The Moonbase (1967). In April 2006, Blue Peter launched
5566-565: The Curse of Fatal Death , a parody starring Rowan Atkinson as a future incarnation of the Doctor in his final battle with the Master ( Jonathan Pryce ), was created for the charity Comic Relief . During the parody's climax, when the Doctor regenerates several times, actors Richard E. Grant , Hugh Grant , Jim Broadbent and Joanna Lumley all had a chance to play the character. Richard E. Grant would go on to play another unofficial incarnation of
5687-538: The Daleks. A pilot-episode script entitled The Destroyers was written but no pilot film was ever produced. Years later, an outline of the story (which would have featured at least one character, Sara Kingdom , later featured in the parent series) appeared in The Official Doctor Who & the Daleks Book . The US Dalek pilot was released on audio by Big Finish Productions in 2010 as part of
5808-574: The Doctor for the webcast of Scream of the Shalka . BBC Video released the special in the same format as regular Doctor Who releases. A second Children in Need special, but one that was part of the series' continuity, was produced for the charity's 2005 appeal. This 7-minute "mini-episode" starred David Tennant as the Tenth Doctor and Billie Piper as Rose Tyler , and filled in a gap between
5929-463: The Doctor. Some non-novel related short stories titled "Brief Encounters" were also written, including one in which the Seventh Doctor met a future incarnation of himself. (The illustration accompanying this story based the future Doctor on actor Nicholas Briggs , who had played the Doctor in unauthorised audio dramas produced by the fan group Audio Visuals . The Briggs Doctor also appeared in
6050-646: The Doctors. The show later introduced another such unknown past Doctor with Jo Martin 's recurring portrayal of the Fugitive Doctor , beginning with " Fugitive of the Judoon " (2020). An example from the classic series comes from The Trial of a Time Lord (1986), in which Michael Jayston 's character the Valeyard is described as an amalgamation of the darker sides of the Doctor's nature, somewhere between
6171-607: The Doomsday Weapon (based upon Colony in Space ) which as written depicts Jo Grant 's first adventure with the Doctor, even though the television series introduced her several serials earlier in Terror of the Autons (which was novelised at a later date and ignored the discrepancy). Authors sometimes added epilogues to their novelisations which were at odds with other material: The Curse of Fenric by Ian Briggs suggested
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#17327795416176292-558: The Land and the Sea . It has been the subject of many parodies and references in popular culture . Doctor Who follows the adventures of the title character, a rogue Time Lord with somewhat unknown origins who goes by the name " the Doctor ". The Doctor fled Gallifrey , the planet of the Time Lords, in a stolen TARDIS ("Time and Relative Dimension(s) in Space"), a time machine that travels by materialising into, and dematerialising out of,
6413-568: The Missing Adventures label. These were two Dalek stories from the Troughton era, The Power of the Daleks and The Evil of the Daleks , which—along with another radio novelisation The Paradise of Death —are considered to be the last of the Target run. Later novelisations tended to be included as part of the original novel series from Virgin. The Ghosts of N-Space , a second radio serial featuring Jon Pertwee produced in
6534-481: The Shalka . Adams' stories were never novelised, reportedly because he wanted to do the job himself. However, soon after his tenure with Doctor Who ended, the author had gained considerable popularity because of his The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy franchise and became (depending upon the source of information) either too busy or too expensive (or both). Adams would later recycle elements of City of Death and
6655-700: The TARDIS' blue police box design in merchandising associated with Doctor Who . In 1998, the Metropolitan Police Authority filed an objection to the trademark claim; but in 2002, the Patent Office ruled in favour of the BBC. The 21st-century revival of the programme became the centrepiece of BBC One's Saturday schedule and "defined the channel". Many renowned actors have made guest-starring appearances in various stories including Kylie Minogue , Sir Ian McKellen , and Andrew Garfield among others. According to an article in
6776-651: The ability to regenerate when there is mortal damage to their body. The Doctor's various incarnations have gained numerous recurring enemies during their travels, including the Daleks , their creator Davros , the Cybermen , and the renegade Time Lord the Master . Doctor Who was originally intended to appeal to a family audience as an educational programme using time travel as a means to explore scientific ideas and famous moments in history. The programme first appeared on
6897-491: The adventures of an extraterrestrial being called the Doctor , part of a humanoid species called Time Lords . The Doctor travels in the universe and in time using a time travelling spaceship called the TARDIS , which externally appears as a British police box . While travelling, the Doctor works to save lives and liberate oppressed peoples by combating foes . The Doctor often travels with companions . Beginning with William Hartnell , fourteen actors have headlined
7018-495: The background of Susan , but both contradict the series and many other stories on the subject. There were also stories in newspapers and comics, storybooks and even serials published on confectionery wrappers and trading cards. In 1979, Nation wrote "Daleks: The Secret Invasion", a novella included in Terry Nation's Dalek Special ; this was the first original Doctor Who -related fiction to be published by Target Books. During
7139-403: The best known outside Doctor Who itself, due to the popularity of his Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy works. The serial format changed for the 2005 revival , with what was now called a series usually consisting of thirteen 45-minute, self-contained episodes (60 minutes with adverts, on overseas commercial channels) and an extended 60-minute episode broadcast on Christmas Day. This system
7260-514: The books being translated for readers in the Netherlands, Brazil , Turkey , the US (where the texts were slightly tweaked to eliminate unfamiliar Anglicisms), Japan , West Germany , Portugal , France and Finland . By 1994, when the final Target book was published, all but six of the broadcast Doctor Who serials had been novelised, as well as a radio serial ( Slipback ), stories slated for
7381-649: The brain's frontal lobe . The phrase retains this association with Doctor Who , to the point that in 1991 the Museum of the Moving Image in London named its exhibition celebrating the programme Behind the Sofa . The electronic theme music too was perceived as eerie, novel, and frightening at the time. A 2012 article placed this childhood juxtaposition of fear and thrill "at the center of many people's relationship with
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#17327795416177502-482: The character since 1981), and more than a dozen former companions. Not meant to be taken seriously, the story had the Rani opening a hole in time, cycling the Doctor and his companions through his previous incarnations and menacing them with monsters from the show's past. It also featured a crossover with the soap opera EastEnders , the action taking place in the latter's Albert Square location. In 1999, Doctor Who and
7623-529: The controller of BBC One. Novelisations based upon individual Doctor Who serials were first published in the mid-1960s, the first being Dr. Who in an Exciting Adventure with the Daleks by David Whitaker , a loose adaptation of the show's second serial, The Daleks . Doctor Who novelisations became something of a tradition beginning in the early 1970s when Target Books (initially published by Universal-Tandem, later to become part of W.H. Allen & Co and then Virgin Publishing ) began publishing them on
7744-401: The depiction of violence". John Nathan-Turner produced the series during the 1980s and said in the documentary More Than Thirty Years in the TARDIS that he looked forward to Whitehouse's comments because the ratings of the series would increase soon after she had made them. Nathan-Turner also got into trouble with BBC executives over the violence he allowed to be depicted for season 22 of
7865-487: The development of the series. On 31 July 1963, Whitaker commissioned Terry Nation to write a story under the title The Mutants . As originally written, the Daleks and Thals were the victims of an alien neutron bomb attack but Nation later dropped the aliens and made the Daleks the aggressors. When the script was presented to Wilson, it was immediately rejected as the programme was not permitted to contain any " bug-eyed monsters ". According to Lambert, "We didn't have
7986-612: The episodes " The Parting of the Ways " and " The Christmas Invasion ". A third Children in Need special, but one that was part of the series' continuity, was produced for the charity's 2007 appeal. " Time Crash " starred David Tennant as the Tenth Doctor and Peter Davison as the Fifth Doctor , and filled in a gap between the episodes " Last of the Time Lords " and " Voyage of the Damned ". This takes part directly after Martha leaves
8107-420: The first two Doctors: William Hartnell and Patrick Troughton . In all, 97 of 253 episodes produced during the programme's first six years are not held in the BBC's archives (most notably seasons 3, 4, and 5, from which 79 episodes are missing). In 1972, almost all episodes then made were known to exist at the BBC, while by 1978 the practice of wiping tapes and destroying "spare" film copies had been brought to
8228-583: The fourth series in 2010. A second animated serial, Dreamland , aired on CBBC in Autumn 2009. David Tennant voiced the Tenth Doctor, and the serial also starred Georgia Tennant (who appeared in Doctor Who 's 2008 series as the Doctor's daughter, Jenny ). On 24 April 2006 The Independent , the Daily Star and The Times confirmed, following past rumours, that K-9 would be featured in
8349-455: The full series started on 24 September 2007, consisting of two-part serials with half-hour individual episodes. Five series were produced altogether, the first four series consisting of twelve episodes each; the fifth series was truncated with only six episodes having been produced before Sladen's death in 2011, as a result of which the programme was cancelled. Sarah Jane's Alien Files , a spin-off of The Sarah Jane Adventures , aired along with
8470-457: The license to produce Doctor Who audios they also started to produce Doctor Who Books. Independent publishing company Candy Jar Books has published five series based on Doctor Who since 2015: Doctor Who Doctor Who is a British science fiction television series broadcast by the BBC since 1963. The series, created by Sydney Newman , C. E. Webber and Donald Wilson , depicts
8591-409: The long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who . Both during the main run of the series from 1963 to 1989 and after its cancellation, numerous novels, comic strips, comic books and other material were generated based on the characters and situations introduced in the show. These spin-offs continued to be produced even without a television series to support them and helped keep
8712-428: The main Doctor Who series and her adventures would be continued in audio form by Big Finish Productions in the 2000s. Since the return of Doctor Who in 2005, the show was accompanied by a documentary series, Doctor Who Confidential , broadcast on BBC Three . Episodes were also edited to a 15-minute run time and rebroadcast with the title Doctor Who Confidential: Cut Down ; these edited versions were included on
8833-424: The mid-1990s was novelised, as were several non BBC spin-off video productions such as Shakedown (as one section of a larger original novel) and Downtime , adding an air of official sanction to them. In 1996, BBC Books published a novelisation of the Doctor Who television movie . A one-time return to serial novelisations occurred in 2004 when BBC Books novelised the made-for-Internet adventure, Scream of
8954-406: The narrative of one story flowing into the next and each episode having its own title, although produced as distinct stories with their own production codes. Following The Gunfighters (1966), however, each serial was given its own title, and the individual parts were assigned episode numbers. Of the programme's many writers , Robert Holmes was the most prolific, while Douglas Adams became
9075-416: The novel rather than the original serial due to the fact the original serial is one of the many that were lost. Also, when Target launched the novelisation line, there was no inkling that ultimately more than 150 of the show's storylines would be adapted; as a result, there are numerous continuity gaps between early Target books and the scripts and/or later published novelisations; one example is Doctor Who and
9196-472: The only way for these "lost" adventures to be experienced prior to the release of soundtracks for those episodes and/or recovery of lost episodes (the Pertwee era, in particular, has been rendered intact since the early 1990s, and several Hartnell and Troughton stories are once again complete). Although novelisations became more elaborate in later years, the early books usually followed a set formula and were for
9317-462: The original run, each weekly episode formed part of a story (or "serial")—usually of four to six parts in earlier years and three to four in later years. Some notable exceptions were: The Daleks' Master Plan , which aired twelve episodes (plus an earlier one-episode teaser, " Mission to the Unknown ", featuring none of the regular cast ); almost an entire season of seven-episode serials (season 7);
9438-436: The production stage appeared in 1981, when a 50-minute pilot episode for a series to be called K-9 and Company was aired. It focused on the adventures of former Doctor Who companions Sarah Jane Smith and K-9 , a robot dog. The pilot, subtitled "A Girl's Best Friend", despite receiving high ratings of 8.4 million, was not commissioned for a development into a series, though Sarah Jane and K-9 would later reappear together on
9559-463: The revival era since 2005), two feature-length productions (1983's " The Five Doctors " and the 1996 television film ), twelve Christmas specials (most of approximately 60 minutes' duration, one of 72 minutes), and four additional specials ranging from 60 to 75 minutes in 2009, 2010, and 2013. Four mini-episodes, running about eight minutes each, were also produced for the 1993, 2005, and 2007 Children in Need charity appeals, while another mini-episode
9680-400: The room to watch the remainder of it. The Economist presented "hiding behind the sofa whenever the Daleks appear" as a British cultural institution on a par with Bovril and tea-time . Paul Parsons, author of The Science of Doctor Who , explains the appeal of hiding behind the sofa as the activation of the fear response in the amygdala in conjunction with reassurances of safety from
9801-422: The same memories, explaining each actor's distinct portrayal, as they all represent different stages in the life of the Doctor and, together, they form a single lifetime with a single narrative. The time-travelling nature of the plot means that different incarnations of the Doctor occasionally meet. In 2017, Jodie Whittaker , as the Thirteenth Doctor , became the first woman to be cast in the lead role. The series
9922-403: The second serial of the programme if it had not been rejected. The story features the Doctor and his companions encountering an ancient civilisation of deactivated robots. Doctor Who was successfully brought back to television in 2005, but for many years there were no plans to novelise episodes from the 21st century version of the programme. Instead, the BBC published original novels featuring
10043-473: The series as the Doctor; as of 2024 , Ncuti Gatwa leads the series as the Fifteenth Doctor . The transition from one actor to another is written into the plot of the series with the concept of regeneration into a new incarnation , a plot device in which, when a Time Lord is fatally injured, their cells regenerate and they are reincarnated, into a different body with mannerisms and behaviour, but
10164-484: The series began production in colour. In 1974, Tom Baker was cast as the Doctor. His eccentric personality became hugely popular, with viewing figures for the series returning to a level not seen since the height of "Dalekmania" a decade earlier. After seven years in the role, Baker was replaced by Peter Davison in 1981, and Colin Baker replaced Davison in 1984. In 1985, the channel's controller Michael Grade cancelled
10285-525: The series had been cancelled. A new animated series called Daleks! , which consists of five 10-minute long episodes, was released on the official Doctor Who YouTube channel in 2020. On 30 October 2023, it was announced that "The Whoniverse ", a new section on BBC iPlayer dedicated to Doctor Who content, would release spin-offs, with the first being Tales of the TARDIS which first premiered on 1 November 2023. On 27 January 2023, Russell T Davies confirmed that future Doctor Who spin-offs were in
10406-434: The series in 1985, which was publicly criticised by controller Michael Grade and given as one of his reasons for suspending the series for 18 months. The phrase "hiding behind the sofa " (or "watching from behind the sofa") entered British pop culture , signifying the stereotypical but apocryphal early-series behaviour of children who wanted to avoid seeing frightening parts of a television programme while remaining in
10527-400: The series previously. Bad Wolf co-produces the series in partnership with BBC Studios Productions . Bad Wolf's involvement sees Gardner return to the series alongside Davies and Jane Tranter , who recommissioned the series in 2005. The programme has been sold to many other countries worldwide ( see § Viewership ). It has been claimed that the transmission of the first episode
10648-418: The series", and a 2011 online vote at Digital Spy deemed the series the "scariest TV show of all time". The image of the TARDIS has become firmly linked to the series in the public's consciousness; BBC scriptwriter Anthony Coburn , who lived in the resort of Herne Bay, Kent , was one of the people who conceived the idea of a police box as a time machine. In 1996, the BBC applied for a trademark to use
10769-446: The series' first season, two from the second, and one from the third, have been adapted. The third-season novelisation, adapting " The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith ", marked the first appearance of the Doctor in a TV-based novelisation since the 1996 TV movie was adapted. Shada by Douglas Adams (not originally completed for broadcast after television production was postponed in 1979, but completed with narration for video, then remade as
10890-543: The series. K-9 was first premiered on 31 October 2009. The 26th and final episode was aired on 25 September 2010. On 1 October 2015 the BBC announced a new spin-off titled, Class , which is set in Coal Hill School . It premièred on BBC Three on 22 October 2016. The eight-episode series is written by Patrick Ness . In March 2016, it was announced that Greg Austin would be cast as Charlie. On 7 September 2017, BBC Three controller Damian Kavanagh confirmed that
11011-560: The show alive in the minds of its fans and the public until the programme was revived in 2005. This entry mainly concentrates on "official" spin-offs, that is to say, material sanctioned by the British Broadcasting Corporation , which produces the series, as well as material sanctioned by the copyright holders of characters from the series. One aspect of Doctor Who spin-offs which makes them different from many spin-offs from other science fiction franchises
11132-534: The show has been co-produced by Bad Wolf and BBC Studios Productions in Cardiff. Doctor Who has spawned numerous spin-offs as part of the Whoniverse , including comic books, films, novels and audio dramas, and the television series Torchwood (2006–2011), The Sarah Jane Adventures (2007–2011), K9 (2009–2010), Class (2016), Tales of the TARDIS (2023–2024), and the upcoming The War Between
11253-436: The television screen onto 8 mm cine film and clips that were shown on other programmes. Audio versions of all lost episodes exist from home viewers who made tape recordings of the show. Short clips from every story with the exception of Marco Polo (1964), " Mission to the Unknown " (1965) and The Massacre (1966) also exist. In addition to these, there are off-screen photographs made by photographer John Cura , who
11374-491: The ten-episode serial The War Games ; and The Trial of a Time Lord , which ran for fourteen episodes (albeit divided into three production codes and four narrative segments) during season 23 . Occasionally, serials were loosely connected by a story line, such as season 8 focusing on the Doctor battling a rogue Time Lord called the Master , season 16 's quest for the Key to Time , season 18 's journey through E-Space and
11495-548: The terms of a deal between BBC Worldwide and SMG Pictures in China, the company has first right of refusal on the purchase for the Chinese market of future series of the programme until and including Series 15. Between 1967 and 1978, large amounts of older material stored in the BBC's various video tape and film libraries was either destroyed or wiped . This included many early episodes of Doctor Who , those stories featuring
11616-418: The theme of entropy, and season 20 's Black Guardian trilogy. The programme was intended to be educational and for family viewing on the early Saturday evening schedule. It initially alternated stories set in the past, which taught younger audience members about history, and with those in the future or outer space, focusing on science. This was also reflected in the Doctor's original companions, one of whom
11737-540: The time vortex. The TARDIS has a vast interior but appears smaller on the outside, and is equipped with a " chameleon circuit " intended to make the machine take on the appearance of local objects as a disguise. Because of a malfunction, the Doctor's TARDIS remains fixed as a blue British police box . Across time and space, the Doctor's many incarnations often find events that pique their curiosity, and try to prevent evil forces from harming innocent people or changing history, using only ingenuity and minimal resources, such as
11858-464: The twelfth and final incarnation. The most recent example is when Richard E. Grant , who previously portrayed an alternate version of the Doctor known as the Shalka Doctor in the animated series Scream of the Shalka (2003), appeared as a hologram of a past Doctor in " Rogue " (2024). Doctor Who spin-offs Doctor Who spin-offs refers to material created outside of, but related to,
11979-457: The unbroadcast Shada into his Dirk Gently novels. As for Saward's two Dalek serials, Target Books was unable to come to an agreement which would satisfy both Eric Saward and Terry Nation's estate for the novelisations. Virgin tried again at a later date and authors were assigned for both books, but again an agreement was not reached. Since the release of the last published book by Target in 1994, six titles remained as yet unpublished: Shada
12100-435: The upcoming twenty-third season, forcing the series into an eighteen-month hiatus. In 1986, the series was recommissioned on the condition that Baker left the role of the Doctor, which was recast to Sylvester McCoy in 1987. Falling viewing numbers, a decline in the public perception of the series and a less-prominent transmission slot saw production ended in 1989 by Peter Cregeen , the BBC's new head of series. Although it
12221-401: The versatile sonic screwdriver . The Doctor rarely travels alone and is often joined by one or more companions on these adventures; these companions are usually humans, owing to the Doctor's fascination with planet Earth , which also leads to frequent collaborations with the international military task force UNIT when Earth is threatened. The Doctor is centuries old and, as a Time Lord, has
12342-545: The works. One spin-off is centered around UNIT and starring Jemma Redgrave as Kate Stewart . Doctor Who also appeared on television in the form of special one-off productions to benefit charity. In 1993, Dimensions in Time was produced for the benefit of Children in Need , coinciding with the series' 30th anniversary. It was a special in two parts, running about 12 minutes in total, which featured all surviving Doctors (including Tom Baker in his first appearance as
12463-484: The years many short stories, novellas and full-length novels have been published. The earliest original Doctor Who fiction were short stories that appeared in the official BBC Doctor Who annuals, which were published from 1964 to 1985 (and later revived by Marvel Comics as Doctor Who Year Books and as annuals by the BBC in 2005). A 45-page novella titled Doctor Who and the Invasion from Space , published in 1966,
12584-493: Was a science teacher and another a history teacher. However, science fiction stories came to dominate the programme, and the history-oriented episodes, which were not popular with the production team, were dropped after The Highlanders (1967). While the show continued to use historical settings, they were generally used as a backdrop for science fiction tales, with one exception: Black Orchid (1982), set in 1920s England. The early stories were serialised in nature, with
12705-473: Was by this time used exclusively for Doctor Who .) Most of these novelisations contained minimal amounts of original material and were (usually) adapted closely from the shooting scripts, with the intent of the books being souvenirs of previously aired shows in the pre-VCR era; the decision by the BBC to delete many episodes from the Hartnell, Troughton and Pertwee eras resulted in many of these books becoming
12826-515: Was confirmed to be the Fourteenth Doctor and the first actor to play two incarnations, having previously played the Tenth Doctor . In the same year, Ncuti Gatwa was revealed to be portraying the Fifteenth Doctor , making him the first black actor to headline the series. In addition to those actors who have headlined the series, others have portrayed versions of the Doctor in guest roles. Notably, in 2013, John Hurt guest-starred as
12947-468: Was delayed by ten minutes due to extended news coverage of the assassination of US President John F. Kennedy the previous day; in fact, it went out after a delay of eighty seconds. The BBC believed that coverage of the assassination, as well as a series of power blackouts across the country, had caused many viewers to miss this introduction to a new series, and it was broadcast again on 30 November 1963, just before episode two. The programme soon became
13068-402: Was effectively cancelled , the BBC repeatedly affirmed over several years that the series would return. While in-house production concluded, the BBC explored an independent production company to relaunch the series. Philip Segal , a British expatriate who worked for Columbia Pictures ' television arm in the United States, had approached the BBC as early as July 1989, while the 26th season
13189-403: Was filmed in 1080i for HDTV and broadcast simultaneously on BBC One and BBC HD . To celebrate the 50th anniversary of the show, a special 3D episode, " The Day of the Doctor ", was broadcast in 2013. In March 2013, it was announced that Tennant and Piper would be returning and that the episode would have a limited cinematic release worldwide. In June 2017, it was announced that due to
13310-468: Was hired by various production personnel to document many of their programmes during the 1950s and 1960s, including Doctor Who . These have been used in fan reconstructions of the serials. The BBC has tolerated these amateur reconstructions, provided they are not sold for profit and are distributed as low-quality copies. One of the most sought-after lost episodes is part four of the last William Hartnell serial, The Tenth Planet (1966), which ends with
13431-492: Was initially shrouded in mystery. In the programme's early days, the character was an eccentric alien traveller of great intelligence who battled injustice while exploring time and space in an unreliable time machine , the " TARDIS " (an acronym for Time and Relative Dimension in Space), which notably appears much larger on the inside than on the outside. The initially irascible and slightly sinister Doctor quickly mellowed into
13552-486: Was mainly responsible for developing the programme, with the first format document for the series being written by Newman along with the head of the script department (later head of serials) Donald Wilson and staff writer C. E. Webber ; in a 1971 interview Wilson claimed to have named the series, and when this claim was put to Newman he did not dispute it. Writer Anthony Coburn , story editor David Whitaker and initial producer Verity Lambert also heavily contributed to
13673-401: Was presented by CBBC and Smile presenter Barney Harwood and Blue Peter presenter Liz Barker . For the show's second series Barker was replaced by SMart presenter Kirsten O'Brien . During the second series, an animated serial, The Infinite Quest , was featured. David Tennant and Freema Agyeman reprised their roles from the live-action television series while Anthony Head ,
13794-470: Was produced by the Canadian animation company Nelvana in the 1980s, but the series was not produced. CBBC originally expressed an interest in a Young Doctor Who series, chronicling the childhood of the Doctor. Russell T Davies vetoed this concept, saying "somehow, the idea of a fourteen-year-old Doctor , on Gallifrey inventing sonic screwdrivers , takes away from the mystery and intrigue of who he
13915-510: Was produced in 2008 for a Doctor Who –themed edition of The Proms . The 1993 two-part story, entitled Dimensions in Time , was made in collaboration with the cast of the BBC soap-opera EastEnders and was filmed partly on the EastEnders set. A two-part mini-episode was also produced for the 2011 edition of Comic Relief . Starting with the 2009 special " Planet of the Dead ", the series
14036-710: Was published on 15 March 2012 by BBC Books , and is still the only remaining book of the original show's run to not be published by Target Books . Target did publish City of Death on 5 April 2018. The Pirate Planet , Resurrection of the Daleks , Revelation of the Daleks , and The Doctor Who TV Movie , were all published on 11 March 2021 by Target Books. Three novels of the original run were rewritten as audiobook exclusives, but were later published in print, once again by Target: From 1988, Titan Books released script books of Doctor Who serials. This included an unproduced serial, The Masters of Luxor (written 1963–1964, published 1992) by Anthony Coburn , which would have been
14157-422: Was responsible for the BBC's first merchandising boom. We had to rely on the story because there was little we could do with the effects. Star Wars in a way was the turning point. Once Star Wars had happened, Doctor Who effectively was out of date from that moment on really, judged by that level of technological expertise. — Philip Hinchcliffe , producer of Doctor Who from 1974 to 1977, on why
14278-434: Was shortened to twelve episodes and one Christmas special following the revival's eighth series , and ten episodes from the eleventh series . Each series includes standalone and multiple episodic stories, often linked with a loose story arc resolved in the series finale. As in the early "classic" era, each episode has its own title, whether stand-alone or part of a larger story. Occasionally, regular-series episodes will exceed
14399-454: Was similarly structured as a single story told as a ten-part mini-series, titled Torchwood: Miracle Day ; unlike previous series, Miracle Day was a co-production between the BBC and the US cable television network Starz . The fourth series premiered on 8 July 2011 on Starz in the US and on July 14, 2011 on BBC One in the United Kingdom. The 2006 and 2007 series were companioned with a CBBC show entitled Totally Doctor Who . Series 1
14520-495: Was still in production. Segal's negotiations eventually led to a Doctor Who television film as a pilot for an American series, broadcast on the Fox Network in 1996, as an international co-production between Fox, Universal Pictures , the BBC and BBC Worldwide . Starring Paul McGann as the Doctor, the film was successful in the UK (with 9.1 million viewers), but was less so in the United States and did not lead to
14641-584: Was the most violent of the drama programmes the corporation produced at the time. The same report found that 3% of the surveyed audience believed the series was "very unsuitable" for family viewing. Responding to the findings of the survey in The Times newspaper, journalist Philip Howard maintained that, "to compare the violence of Dr Who , sired by a horse-laugh out of a nightmare, with the more realistic violence of other television series, where actors who look like human beings bleed paint that looks like blood,
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