Before the Flood has debuted in Australia, averaging 511,000 viewers in the five major capital cities. It was the second-highest rating ABC drama of the day and the nineteenth highest rating program of the day overall. These ratings do not include regional or time-shifted viewers.

Meanwhile, including time-shifted viewers, The Witch's Familiar averaged 734,000 consolidated viewers in the five major capital cities. With 192,000 extra viewers, it was the highest time-shifted program of the day and the seventh highest rating program of the day overall. These ratings do not include regional viewers.

Philip Morris of Television International Enterprises Archives (TIEA), who returned nine previously missing episodes of Doctor Who to the BBC Archives in 2013, recently revealed that he had found all episodes of The Web of Fear back then. Episode 3, featuring the first appearance of Colonel Lethbridge-Stewart, went missing again shortly after the discovery, presumably stolen and sold to a private collector.

The Doctor Who Missing Episodes Discussion Group on Facebook has now been given a photo of all 12 film cans found in Africa. They posted the picture on the Facebook group with permission by Philip Morris. On the photo you can see the production code PP (The Enemy of the World) written on the side of one of the cans, the further eleven cans are also part of that serial and of the following story The Web of Fear (Code QQ). Among them is the now once again missing episode 3 of the classic "Yeti's in the Underground"-story.

The following statement was released on Facebook:

On the second anniversary of the release of the newly-recovered and restored “Enemy Of The World” and “Web Of Fear”, Philip Morris, Executive Director of TIEA has authorized us (The Doctor Who Missing Episodes Group on Facebook) to release this photograph of the twelve film cans which he originally discovered in Jos, Nigeria.

This photo was taken immediately after Phil had discovered the film cans and verified that the film reels inside matched what was on the labels.

As you are no doubt aware, one of these film cans - the one containing Episode 3 of “The Web Of Fear” – went missing in between when this photo was taken (in late 2011) and when the cans were delivered to the central collection point in Abuja, Nigeria. The location and disposition of this film can and its contents is currently unknown.

Philip Morris put out the following statement:

The picture you see is one I took after checking the 12 Doctor Who film cans in Jos in 2011. All film leaders were checked to ensure cans matched their contents, this is a practice we follow in fine detail with due care shown. All programmes held at this station were physically checked by myself and my own team. No undue attention was drawn to the Doctor Who prints by myself or any of my staff, however I instructed one of my trusted team to ensure the Doctor Who prints were hidden until authorisation for retrieval could be obtained.

However two prints, one QQ3 Web of Fear 3 and another spare print were taken from one of my guys by a guy at the station who took the two prints to his office. This was reported to me within hours. I was not unduly concerned I knew their location. I have to admit I was really excited and told somebody I thought would not leak any sensitive information - big big mistake. Within 4/5 days the station had been named online. Fortunately by this time our job was done, however what of Web 3? I physically searched Jos again, asked the guy who took the films where they were. Initially he denied all knowledge until I produced the picture-he just looked at the floor and said he put them back on the shelf.

I didn't believe a word, and took the pictures and with one of my collegues and went straight to the top of the NTA, however the guy simply denied it. That is until earlier this year when I returned to Nigeria. I met the same guy again so I asked him directly - he just laughed and said "I don't know anything about missing episodes."
I firmly believe this episode is in the hands of a fan and we will trace it. I hope this goes someway to explain why I must maintain a certain level of security around TIEA and its work.

Thanks to the Doctor Who Missing Episodes Group and to Philip Morris for the kind permission to publish the picture on DWN.

Actor and Stunt Arranger Derek Ware has died at the age of 77.

Derek Ware was a regular performer on Doctor Who throughout the first ten years of its existence, appearing in at least 21 episodes and acting as Fight Arranger in many more.

He appeared in the very first story, An Unearthly Child, where he doubled for actor Jeremy Young, in the fight scene between the cavemen Kal and Za, arranging Doctor Who's first fight scene. He returned to the series arranging the fight between Marco and Tegana in Marco Polo and between Ian and Ixta in The Aztecs.. As well as Fight Arranging he was back before the cameras in The Crusade playing a Saracen Warrior.

Later that year he played a Bus Conductor in the final scenes of The Chase where Ian and Barbara return to London. He continued with roles in The Myth Makers and the epic The Daleks' Master Plan where he played the Egyptian messenger Tuthmos. He played a Spaniard in The Smugglers

He again arranged the fights in the Patrick Troughton stories The Underwater Menace and The Web of Fear.

In 1970 he formed HAVOC, a team of specialist stunt performers who regularly worked on the third Doctor's era of the show. The Ambassadors of Death, Inferno, where he played Private Wyatt, Terror of the Autons, The Sea Devils and The Claws of Axos all benefited from his skills, with Ware himself playing the tramp Pigbin Josh in the latter story.

Costs and Union problems saw the end of HAVOC after the end of Season 9, and Ware never worked on Doctor Who again.

Ware continued his work as a stunt performer working on series such as Z Cars, Colditz, King Cinder, The Prisoner of Zenda, The Kenny Everett Television Show and Last of the Summer Wine. He appeared with Michael Crawford in a well known clip from the comedy series Some Mother's Do 'Ave 'Em when he played a window cleaner working alongside the hapless Frank Spencer. The stunt, which featured both actors hanging from a window cleaning platform on the side of a London skyscraper, went wrong when the cradle became stuck, resulting in both actors being trapped 300 feet above the ground.

Film work included The Italian Job, Krull, Willow and Robin Hood: Prince Of Thieves.

Derek Ware had trained at RADA and for many years a Derek Ware Prize was awarded at the academy for the best fight based around a classical text.

This item Contains Plot Spoilers

Press reaction to Doctor Who: Before the Flood is in, with the Guardian admiring the timey wimey structure of the story, finding it mind-boggling in its ingenuity, its time-hopping central premise enough to leave you scratching your head for days". They loved the the main protagonist, "I’m not one to scare easily, but found the realisation of the Fisher King difficult to look at, putting this old fanboy in mind of the Destroyer from 1989’s Battlefield (surely a design classic).".

The Telegraph felt the fisher king was underused. "The scares were fewer this week – though there was certainly tension to be found in a deaf woman being followed by a ghost wielding an axe. And the much-hyped Fisher King was sadly little seen....Given that the character’s voice was performed by the talented Peter Serafinowicz (Star Wars’ Darth Maul) it was a shame he didn’t get a bit more dialogue".

The Express got very confused over timey wimey nature of the story. "When it comes to trying to understand time travel and paradoxes on Doctor Who, just don’t. Put any efforts to one side, just go with it and take it at face value. If the 10-year-old sitting in front of you can do it, so can you. Once you manage to bypass the timey wimey chaos ensuing in front of your eyes, it’s quite a pleasurable way to spend a Saturday evening in front of the television."

The Metro found the events on the Drum underwhelming, but loved the realisation of the Ghosts. Without uttering even a word of dialogue, the ghosts are one of the scariest and most effective creations seen in modern Who.

Digital Spy thought the episode scary and smart and praised Paul Kay, who played the Tivolian Prentis, "Kaye is terrific as Prentis - it's just a shame his screen-time is so brief as to relegate the one-time Dennis Pennis to little more than a glorified cameo". Den of Geek saved its main praise for The Doctor himself, Peter Capaldi. "We're four episodes into his second series in the TARDIS, and it just feels like he utterly belongs there. His performance continues to mix grumpiness, friendliness, intelligence and a large dose of alien. Leading the detective work across this particular two parter, he's been on excellent, excellent form".

Radio Times was again not convinced by the episode. "I have to be frank and say that while I find Before the Flood marginally more intriguing than Under the Lake, as a brace of episodes they do little to float my boat, buzz my sonic or activate my time rotor". The reviewer points out his ten year old nephew loved the story. "Perhaps I need to reconnect with my inner ten-year-old to evaluate Doctor Who in 2015"

The Register enjoyed the introduction of the bootstrap paradox. "We've seen this device used a few times in the rebooted version of Doctor Who; such as 2005's Father's Day and Blink, which was first broadcast in 2007. And, of course, loopy paradoxes paradoxically loop their way through the TV drama's 52-year-long history", however TV.Com felt the detailed explanations of the difficulties of time travel were unnecessary and were spoon feeding the audience."I love that feeling of being slightly out of control as my mind tries to bend the story to fit what my brain thinks is logical. But I also really love it when I'm allowed to reach the conclusion on my own without being nudged toward it or, in this case, having it bronzed, mounted in a glass case, and then put under a giant spotlight".

Mashable loved the way the episode opened, with The Doctor talking directly into camera. "Not only did it break the fourth wall, not only did it spin a neat little self-contained tall tale that suggests the Doctor may actually be Beethoven, it also basically gave the plot of the episode away, which unless you're really paying attention, you only realize in retrospect"

For IGN the highlight came at the end of the story. "It thrilled me so. I’m referring to the last 30 seconds or so, where the Doctor breaks down the bootstrap paradox of it all for Clara. Her wow moment of realization as the Doctor says, “When did I first have those ideas, Clara?" followed by “Who composed Beethoven's 5th?" followed by his looking down at the camera, at us, and just ever so slightly shrugging. Man, it gave me goosebumps!"

You can read the Doctor Who News review in our reviews section.

4.38 Million viewers watched Doctor Who: Before the Flood, according to unofficial overnight viewing figures.

The programme had an audience share of 21.5%, up from last weeks share of just 16%, helped by the lower rating for the Rugby World Cup on ITV. This week, with England out of the competition, an average of just 3.51 million tuned in to see the host country play Uruguay.

Top for the day was Strictly Come Dancing with 8.91 million watching, while ITV's highest audience was for the Rugby, but not for the match showing opposite The Doctor. Australia v Wales at 4.30pm had 4.75 million watching.

Casualty edged just above The Doctor with 4.42 million views pushing Doctor Who into 4th place for the day. Doctor Who is currently 33rd for the week.

Official consolidated figures will be released next week.

The BBC have released clips looking behind the scenes of this weeks episode of Doctor Who, Before the Flood.




A full review of the episode can be found on Doctor Who Reviews

On the eve of the second anniversary of their publicised recovery, Fantom Films have announced a special project to provide commentaries for The Enemy of the World and The Web of Fear, the two returned Season Five stories starring Patrick Troughton that were released 'vanilla' on DVD and via iTunes. Who Talk! will see cast and crew brought together to discuss the two stories, under the guidance of commentary moderation stalwart Toby Hadoke.


The commentaries will be released on both CD and download formats, and will feature Deborah Watling for both stories, with Enemy represented by Mary Peach, Milton Johns, Carmen Munroe and Bill Lyons, and Web by Ralph Watson, John Levene, and Derek Martin; production reminiscences are provided by Sylvia James and Roger Bunce. In addition, the still unaccounted for episode three of the latter story will feature former BBC Archivist Sue Malden, who gives insight into the BBC policies of wiping and archiving material, as well as missing television in general.

Producer Paul WT Ballard says:
He also advised:

The two releases will be published in November 2015, and will be available to pre-order at a discounted price. See the Fantom Films website for full details.



Please note: these commentaries contain no BBC copyrighted elements and do not feature audio from the episodes themselves - these are designed to be played alongside the official DVD/iTunes releases.

Series producer Paul Tams has reported to us that there will shortly be an annoucement over the future of K-9, who appeared in his own series back in 2009.

The announcement will be made by him and K-9 co-creator Bob Baker at the DWAS convention Back to the Eighties, which takes place on the 24th October.

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Meanwhile, the duo will also be signing copies of their book, The Essentia Book of K-9, at The Comic Guru store in Cardiff on Saturday 10th October, which celebrates twelve years of comic and sci-fi/Doctor Who specialities.


The book can be ordered directly from the K-9 Official website.

It was on Saturday 9th October 1965, fifty years ago today, that the last ever Doctor Who to be produced by the series first producer, Verity Lambert, was broadcast.

Verity Lambert had decided to move on from the series at the end of the second year of recording. She had been with the series since June 1963, when BBC Head of Drama Sydney Newman recruited her to produce his new science fiction series.

As the BBC's youngest, and sole female drama producer, she had faced many battles within the Corporation and had steered the programme from its very uncertain beginnings to a point where it was attracting audiences of up to 13 million viewers to BBC One in the early evening.

Against the odds she had created a series which would run and run and, 50 years later, is one of the biggest global brands the BBC possesses.

Sydney Newman had no doubt where the success of the series lay, as he told Doctor Who Magazine in 1993 Lambert's final story, Mission to the Unknown is unique in the history of Doctor Who in that it features neither The Doctor, or any of his current companions, who at the time were Steven and Vicki.

The idea for the story was conceived early in 1965 when Terry Nation had been discussing ideas with the production team for the third production block of the series. Such was the success of the Daleks than another story involving them would be needed. A six part story, later to be expanded to twelve episodes, was commissioned from their creator along with a special 'trailer' episode for the story that would feature none of the regular cast and would be known as Dalek Cutaway.

The extra episode was to be scheduled at the end of the second year of recording. The absence of the regular cast would allow them all to have an extra week's holiday in the gap between the recording blocks for season two and three. Despite missing from the episode, William Hartnell would still be credited as his contract specified he would be credited for all episodes, a stipulation that did not apply to his companions Peter Purves and Maureen O'Brien.

Verity Lambert had effectively left the series by the time Mission to the Unknown was recorded, but her official contract with the series ended with the recording of the episode, in Television Centre Studio 3, on Friday 18th August. Her successor would be John Wiles, a BBC staff writer who had recently been promoted to producer. Script Editor Dennis Spooner was also moving on from the series, where he was replaced by Donald Tosh.

To help ease the transition, Lambert and Spooner wrote a document headed The History of Doctor Who, giving an introduction to the series. They were very keen to keep the internal history of the show intact and avoid conflicts in the story arc. When Lambert left Doctor Who she was offered the producer role on a new BBC series Adam Adamant Lives! , as well as launching a new soap opera The Newcomers. Other productions for the BBC included a season of the crime drama Detective and a 26-part series of adaptations of the stories of William Somerset Maugham.

She left the BBC in 1969 to join London Weekend Television, where she produced Budgie and Between the Wars, before returning to the BBC to produce Shoulder to Shoulder, a series of six 75-minute plays about the suffragette movement of the early 20th century. In the 1970's she became Head of Drama at Thames Television, and was responsible for overseeing the work of Euston Films, Thames' subsidiary film production company, where she enjoyed the most sustained period of critical and popular success of her career. Her work included The Naked Civil Servant, with John Hurt, Rock Follies, Rumpole of the Bailey, The Sweeney, and Edward and Mrs Simpson. In 1979 she transferred to Euston films full time overseeing productions such as Quatermass, Minder and Widows.

In 1985 she established her own independent production company, Cinema Verity, producing the feature film A Cry in the Dark and the Channel 4 commissioned drama G.B.H. A less successful Cinema Verity production, was the soap opera Eldorado which was cancelled after a year. In the early 1990s, Lambert attempted to win the rights to produce Doctor Who independently for the BBC; however, this effort was unsuccessful because the Corporation was already in negotiations with producer Philip Segal in the United States.

Her work continued into the 21st Centurary, producing Jonathan Creek and The Cazalets for the BBC. Her last production was the comedy-drama, Love Soup.

Verity Lambert died on the 22 November 2007, the day before Doctor Who's 44th Birthday. A blue heritage plaque in her honour was unveiled by the Doctor Who Appreciation Society and the Riverside Trust, at Riverside Studios in Hammersmith, London in 2014.

The premiere of Series Nine, The Magician's Apprentice, is to receive a special screening in Italy on Friday 30th October as part of the Lucca Comic and Games Festival. The episode, which will be dubbed into Italian, will be shown at 6:30pm at Cinema Astraat, and will be introduced by its writer, Steven Moffat.

The series' lead writer is at the event for the weekend, and will feature in a Q&A alongside fellow writer Jamie Mathieson in the San Romano auditorium at 9:00pm on Saturday, which will be hosted by comic writer Gabriella Cordone Lisiero. Fans will have the opportunity to ask questions about the writing process and how a Doctor Who script is turned from words on a page to the series seen on screen.

Tickets for both events are available on the festival website website (English version of the site here).


The series itself, also dubbed into Italian, is expected to be shown in the country within the next few months on RAI4; full details will be available via the This Week in Doctor Who website and on Facebook once known.