The official Doctor Who Facebook site announced today that German fans will be able to see Series 9 sooner than expected. From 20th September on, every Sunday, iTunes will make the episode that was broadcast the day before in the UK, available.

Not long from now and the Doctor will return - in his 9th Series for the first time in English with German subtitles! Pre-order your season pass now and don't miss any episodes from the 20th September on.

You can pre-order the season pass for the German subtitled episodes here: http://apple.co/1PIoaHe

More international season passes:

UK: iTunes, Amazon Instant Video, Google Play

US: iTunes, Amazon Instant Video

CA: iTunes

Series 9 will be broadcasted dubbed in German on FOX in December.

BBC Worldwide have confirmed the broadcast of series premiere The Magician's Apprentice in some more of their worldwide schedules.

The Far East will get to see the latest adventures of the Doctor and Clara only a few hours after the United Kingdom, with BBC Asia confirming that it will show the episode on Saturday 20th September at 10:00am (3:00am UK time). The series will be shown on BBC Entertainment at both 10:00am and a prime-time 8:15pm, with various repeats throughout the week thereafter. The channel is currently available in Singapore, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mongolia, Burma, South Korea, Taiwan and Thailand.

Belgium and the Netherlands will see The Magician's Apprentice a couple of days later, as BBC First air the premiere prime-time on Monday 22nd September at 9:00pm; as with BBC Asia the episode will be repeated several times during the week before the next episode airs.

The Magician's Apprentice: Known Broadcast Details
United Kingdom	BBC One	Sat 19 Sep 2015	time tbc
United States of America	BBC America	Sat 19 Sep 2015	9:00pm EDT	(2:00am BST)
Canada	SPACE	Sat 19 Sep 2015	9:00pm EDT	(2:00am BST)
Asia Pacific	BBC Entertainment	Sun 20 Sep 2015	10:00am SGT	(3:00am BST)
Australia	ABC	Sun 20 Sep 2015	7:40pm AEST	(10:40am BST)
Europe (Benelux)	BBC First	Tue 22 Sep 2015	9:00pm CEST
Finland	YLE2	Mon 28 Sep 2015	6:00pm EEST
New Zealand	PRIME	Sep 2015	date tbc
South Africa	BBC First	Sat 24 Oct 2015	6:00pm SAST
Germany	FOX	December 2015	date tbc	(dubbed into German)
India	FX	"coming soon in 2015"	date tbc
Italy	RAI4	Early 2016	date tbc	(dubbed into Italian)

Update: Australia is now confirmed for 7:40pm 20th September

Check our guide page for the latest transmission updates, and for general broadcasting details around the world see This Week in Doctor Who.

As the premiere of new series opener The Magician's Apprentice rapidly approaches, here is a roundup of the television channels that have currently announced their plans to show the episode:

United Kingdom: BBC One, Saturday 19th September

The home channel of Doctor Who, of course! Unlike previous years the date was announced quite a way in advance, though the actual time of broadcast has yet to be confirmed - it is expected that the show will occupy the time-slot either immediately before or after BBC One's 'traditional' Autumn Saturday evening entertainment show Strictly Come Dancing. The BBC Media Centre publish their details of programmes transmitted from the 19th September next Thursday (though the time might still need 'to be confirmed').

USA: BBC America, Saturday 19th September, 9:00pm EST

The first channel to announce a broadcast time, BBC America will show the series in its own 'traditional' prime-time slot on Saturday evenings.

Canada: SPACE, Saturday 19th September, 9:00pm EST

The Canadian channel has confirmed to us that they too will broadcast the premiere at the same time as the United States.

Australia: ABC, Sunday 20th September

Trailers have been broadcasting on ABC to confirm that, as in previous years, the episode will be broadcast within 24 hours of the United Kingdom (and also available on their iView platform) - there has been no confirmation as yet whether the channel will also simulcast the episode in the early hours of the morning. ABC's Media Room should have details for that week available next Tuesday.

New Zealand: PRIME

As of writing, PRIME have yet to reveal when they are showing the episode, though they have confirmed it will be in September.

Finland: YLE2, Monday 28th September, ~6:00pm

The Finnish channel have confirmed that they will be showing the series on Monday evenings (these are broadcast in English). The actual time might change from 6:00pm, depending upon other programming.

South Africa: BBC First, Saturday 24th October, 6:00pm

Doctor Who will be one of the flagship programmes on the new BBC Worldwide channel BBC First in South Africa, which launches on the 18th October. The series has been confirmed for Saturday evenings.

Germany: FOX, December

FOX announced that, unlike previous years, they would not be showing Doctor Who until December. Last year there were unforeseen problems over arrangements with BBC Worldwide causing the German dub to be unavailable for broadcast, leading to the channel broadcasting a subtitled English version instead with the German version following after the series had ended - this time around the premiere on the channel will be the German version.

India: FX

The Indian broadcaster has announced that they plan to show the new series, but have yet to confirm the date when the series will start. FX recently took up the mantle for broadcasting Doctor Who in India, where the show hadn't been seen since BBC Worldwide ceased broadcasting there in 2012.

Check our guide page for the latest transmission updates, and for general broadcasting details around the world see This Week in Doctor Who.

The last week has seen the cast of Doctor Who visiting Berlin, in a country where the show has grown in popularity for the last few years. Here is a news update on current and upcoming developments in Germany:

• FOX announced that Series 9 will premiere in December, almost three months after the UK. This is a departure from the near simulcast broadcasts from recent years. Last year, problems with the BBC's delivery of the material needed to dub Series 8 in time, resulted in near simulcast airings of the episodes in English with German subtitles.

• Books publisher Cross Cult announced the release of a monthly e-books series called Zeitreisen (Time Trips). Book 1 Die Todesgrube ("The Death Pit") by A.L. Kennedy will be released on 26th October 2015. It can be pre-ordered at Amazon Germany.
  More upcoming printed titles include the eighth Doctor novels Silhouette by Justin Richard on 24th August 2015 and Der Kriechende Terror ("The Crawling Terror") by Mike Tucker on 8th February 2016. November will see the release of the novelisation of City of Death, written by James Goss, with the German title Die Stadt des Todes.

• German online audio books platform Audible has announced the release of Gareth Robert's Shada novelisation. It will be unabridged and read by Michael Schwarzmaier, who dubbed Tom Baker in the German versions of The Five Doctors and in Day of the Doctor. The audio book can be pre-ordered on Amazon Germany.

• The first German convention for fans of Doctor Who, the TimeLash Event, has now sold out. Guests include Paul McGann, Nicholas Briggs, Catrin Stewart, Nicola Bryant, Terry Molloy, Toby Hadoke, Nev Fountain, Terrance Dicks, Andrew Cartmel and many more. It takes place in Kassel on the 24th to 25th October 2015.

• DVD distributer Pandastorm Pictures has released a trailer for the upcoming German DVD boxed set of Die Fünf Doktoren (20th anniversary special The Five Doctors). The 3-disc-set will contain the 90 minute TV-version, the three-parter that was shown in Germany in 1995 and the 100 minute special edition. The set will be released on 28th August 2015. The trailer can be viewed below.

“Will this man influence young minds?”

That was the question asked of Canadian parents 50 years ago on January 23, 1965, when the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) became the first North American broadcaster to air Doctor Who. At this time, only two other markets outside the UK, New Zealand and Australia, had aired the show. Efforts to sell the low-budgeted series had failed in the US where glossier British imports like The Saint held sway. But the CBC was very much like the BBC and low-budgeted, studio-bound productions were common, so Doctor Who found a Canadian home.

The fact the series was in part devised by Canadian Sydney Newman, who had worked for the CBC until the late 1950s, likely was a selling point in its favour.

To mark the debut, the January 23, 1965 edition of CBC Times (long-defunct Canadian equivalent of Radio Times) got into the spirit by publishing a faux memo to the nation’s parents, “warning” them of the impending arrival of “Dr. Who” in their living rooms, illustrated with an image of William Hartnell and a pair of Sensorites.

Broadcasts began with An Unearthly Child, with the series scheduled at 5 p.m. on Saturdays, mimicking the BBC’s scheduling (some CBC affiliates aired it at different times). After episode 6 of The Daleks, however, the CBC took Doctor Who off the air for more than two weeks and when it returned it was in a new timeslot on Wednesday afternoons.

With many CBC stations broadcasting close to the border, some American markets, such as Seattle and Detroit, would have been able to see the show, nearly a decade before the Jon Pertwee-era episodes were finally syndicated there.

Ultimately, Doctor Who was destined for a short run on the CBC. After July 2, 1965, the show was abruptly cancelled after the conclusion of The Keys of Marinus (according to the research site BroaDWcast.org, it’s possible at least one affiliate was forced to pull the show midway through the serial). Ironically, the show was pulled before getting to The Sensorites, the storyline promoted in the original CBC Times memo.

Doctor Who would not be shown in Canada again until 1976 when local broadcasters in Vancouver and Ontario began showing the Pertwee era. The episodes aired by the CBC in 1965 (minus the now-lost Marco Polo, but finally including the long-delayed The Sensorites) would not be seen again until the youth-oriented cable network YTV began showing them in the late 1980s, followed by Space in 1997.

The CBC would play a role in the revival of Doctor Who in 2005, receiving a co-production credit for the first few seasons and airing the show in prime-time only a few weeks after the UK. For Series 1, the network recruited Christopher Eccleston to record special bumpers and intros and promotions for a visit-the-set contest sponsored by TV Guide; Billie Piper (donning an iconic Roots top) performed similar duties when The Christmas Invasion aired only one day after the UK. The CBC also produced its own behind-the-scenes featurettes that aired alongside the main show.

By 2008, however, interest in the series at the CBC (which had similarly supported, broadcast, and then cancelled Torchwood) had waned. With Series 2, the gap between UK and Canadian airings extended to months and the CBC split the season (years before the BBC ever did) between The Impossible Planet and The Satan Pit. It skipped the 2007 Christmas special Voyage of the Damned altogether, and aired an international edit of Journey's End that was heavily criticized by Canadian fans. In early 2009, Space picked up the rights to air The Next Doctor and everything that followed. The CBC continued to air Modern Era reruns for the next couple of years on the main network and its digital network Bold, before quietly ending its run.

The CBC’s original broadcast of Doctor Who has retained some interest decades later due to the fact one story shown in its entirety was the now-lost Marco Polo. However, despite the fact the series aired on affiliates from St. John’s, Nfld., to Vancouver, B.C., to date no copy of this serial has emerged from the Great White North.

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Learn more about the history of CBC and Canadian broadcasts of Classic Era Doctor Who at BroaDWcast.org. The site, run by Jon Preddle, John Lavalie and Steven Warren Hill, is always on the hunt for information about non-UK broadcasts of Doctor Who, including those in Canada. The ongoing adventures of Doctor Who on television in North America can be followed via This Week in Doctor Who.

American broadcaster Retro TV will air third Doctor adventure The Mind of Evil in colour next month, the first television channel in the world to do so since the late 1970s!

With the original transmission tapes long-sinced erased, by the beginning of the 1980s only black and white prints of the episodes were still held by the BBC, meaning that the story has only been available to broadcasters around the world since then in that format. However, 2013 saw the story prepared for release on DVD with a newly colourised episode one by Stuart Humphryes (aka Babelcolour) and Peter Crocker, and colour-recovered episodes two to six by Richard Russell. Premiered at the British Film Institute in March last year, the story has since been shown a number of select locations, and made available on DVD and streaming services such as Hulu; Retro's broadcast will mark the first time the story can be enjoyed in colour on broadcast television once more.

Stuart Humphryes told us:
More details about the colourisation process for episode one can be read via the Babelcolour website.

Episode One airs on Retro from 8:30pm on the 15th October.

With an 8:30pm timeslot for the new Doctor's sixth adventure The Caretaker announced by the BBC earlier this week, German broadcaster FOX have now confirmed that they will amend their schedule to accomodate the later time. The channel has to date aired the series at 9:00pm European time, a little later than the BBC One broadcast, but from the 27th September German viewers will be able to enjoy the episode simulataneously with those in the United Kingdom.

FOX told us:

The series is currently broadcast in English on Saturday evenings, preceeded by the previous episode with subtitles; the entire series is due to be repeated with a German soundtrack from the 15th November.

On the 23rd November 2013 the world celebrated Doctor Who reaching its fiftieth anniversary, receiving a Guinness World Record as some 94 countries were officially recorded as having shown the anniversary episode. However, the 18th September 2014 sees another milestone celebrated as, fifty years ago, An Unearthly Child was to receive its first-ever international broadcast.

The country in question was New Zealand, with the Doctor's very first appearance outside the United Kingdom to be broadcast by Christchurch's CHTV-3. The episode was shown at 7:57pm, sandwiched between news programme NZBC Reports... and a documentary about Dr. Gordon Seagrave, The Burma Surgeon Today, and was introduced by the weekly magazine The New Zealand Listener as:


You can read the country's introduction to the Doctor from the Listener below.

FOX Deutschland has announced today on Facebook that they are going to broadcast Series 8 dubbed into German from November 15th. They will show two episodes every Saturday at 7.15 pm.

Here is the full statement by FOX:


As previously reported FOX was forced to change their plans at the last minute, transmitting Deep Breath and every episode since in english instead of german, after BBC Worldwide failed to deliver the material needed for the dub in time. BBC Worldwide issued an apology but were unable to state when they were willing to deliver the material needed.