The Story of Doctor Who, a one-hour documentary celebrating the show's 40th anniversary, will air on BBC1 on Tuesday December 30 at 6:30pm. Says the blurb: "Nostalgic retrospective of the longest-running sci-fi series ever, which made its low-key debut 40 years ago and went on to become a national institution that had generations of young viewers hiding behind their sofas from the colourful alien menaces tackled by the time-travelling hero. This documentary features behind-the-scenes revelations, recalls some of the classic stories from the series' past and interviews all the surviving actors who have played the good Doctor on TV, including Tom Baker and Peter Davison." (Thanks to Alexander Sives, Phillip Madeley, Neil Perryman, John Leacey, Andrew Foxley)

Gavyn Davies, the BBC Chairman, made a speech in Cardiff last night to the BBC Governors, and made the following comment: "The new Doctor Who will come from Cardiff, though he will not necessarily speak Welsh." The speech is reprinted here in its entirety; it's likely that he was referring to the production, not a future cast member. (Thanks to Steve Tribe)

Interesting rumor, take with a grain of salt: a radio update on New Zealand's Newstalk 1ZB on Tuesday morning stated that the first new Doctor Who episode would be filmed in that country, at Mount Ruapehu. The mountain (seen most recently in the "Lord of the Rings" films) is one of New Zealand's more popular ski resort areas. Of course, Outpost Gallifrey doubts that this is any more than simple wishful thinking, as location scouting for any new series is likely not to have yet begun. Update: Mount Ruapehu also features in the first episode of "The Scream of the Shalka" so it's likely this is where the confusion lies, mistaking "Shalka" for the new series. (Thanks to Campbell Pentney, and Jeff Murray for the addendum)

Sunday night's Adult Swim block of programming on the Cartoon Network featured a tribute to Doctor Who's anniversary. The brief announcement, at the end of the "Sealab 2021" animated program, featured a voiceover with some artwork (silhouettes of various iconic images from the show.) Obviously there's a Doctor Who fan in the office, there... (Thanks to Graeme Burk, Mike Fuller)

New items in the papers today: icLiverpool celebrates the 40th anniversary in an article that includes comments from several Doctors, including Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy. "I think the next Doctor should be a woman - Dawn French," said Colin. "She'd be fabulous, but I don't know if they'd have the bottle to do it this time." icWales also chimes in with anarticle about the show which includes comments from Russell T. Davies, in which he comments about being bombarded with personal e-mails from 'fans' demanding the return of the Daleks Cybermen, and so forth! The article speculates that there will be seven episodes, but this is speculative. (Thanks to Steve Tribe)

The British Board of Film Classification website is listing the following extras for the forthcoming DVD release of The Visitation starring Peter Davison, Sarah Sutton, Janet Fielding and Matthew Waterhouse, due out in January:


These items include the half-hour interview segment with director Peter Moffatt, a featurette about the scoring of the episode and other items. More when it's available.