A pack shot has now been released for the forthcoming 50th Anniversary audio adventure The Light at the End from Big Finish. Tom Baker, Peter Davison, Colin Baker, Sylvester McCoy and Paul McGann unite as the Doctor(s), accompanied by Louise Jameson, Sarah Sutton, Nicola Bryant, Sophie Aldred and India Fisher as their companions. Geoffrey Beevers plays The Master, and there are also cameo appearances by Carole Ann Ford, William Russell, Maureen O’Brien, Peter Purves, Jean Marsh, Anneke Wills, Frazer Hines, Wendy Padbury, Katy Manning, Mark Strickson and Janet Fielding.


The five disc box set, which includes deluxe packaging and a lavish booklet, comprises:

• Discs 1 and 2 – The Light at the End
• Disc 3 – The Making of the Light at the End, featuring interviews with the actors and production crew
• Disc 4 – This is Big Finish, a look at the current Doctor Who audio output of the company, with interviews with the actors and producers.
• Disc 5 – The Companion Chronicles: The Revenants – William Russell performs as Ian Chesterton in a First Doctor story originally released as a download with Doctor Who Magazine.

Producer David Richardson said:

The Light at the End is available for pre-order.

Videos of the guest panels from the two most recent celebratory screenings by the BFI were released today.

The BFI is running a Doctor Who At 50 season throughout this year, curated by Justin Johnson and Dick Fiddy, and a six-minute excerpt from the question-and-answer session at the Seventh Doctor event, held on Saturday 27th July and which saw a big-screen showing of Remembrance of the Daleks, features Sylvester McCoy, Sophie Aldred, and Ben Aaronovitch in conversation with Johnson.


Meanwhile, the Ninth Doctor event - held on Saturday 24th August with Bad Wolf and The Parting of The Ways being screened - spawned a longer video, with Joe Ahearne, Phil Collinson, and Bruno Langley on the panel.


The next event, which will mark the Tenth Doctor's era, is to take place at the BFI on Sunday 29th September when the episodes The Stolen Earth and Journey's End will be shown and - as previously reported - David Tennant will be among the special guests. As with all the other events in the BFI season it has sold out, but returns are possible - keep checking here - as are stand-bys on the day.

Less than a week after that - and again as previously reported - Paul McGann will be the headline guest on Saturday 5th October at the sold-out event in honour of his time as the Eighth Doctor, with a screening of the TV Movie taking place. The full guest line-up, announced today, will be Daphne Ashbrook, Geoffrey Sax, Andrew Cartmel, Gary Russell, Nicholas Briggs, and Jason Haigh-Ellery. Cartmel, Briggs, Russell, and Haigh-Ellery will be forming a panel to talk about the years between the McGann movie and the show's return, while McGann, Ashbrook, and Sax will be the panel guests following the screening.

Yesterday, Ashbrook revealed on her website that she would be taking part, commenting: The event will be followed by a signing at the BFI Shop of advance copies of the BBC's 50th-anniversary book Doctor Who - The Vault, due out on Thursday 24th October, with author Marcus Hearn. Check here for returns for the Eighth Doctor event or try for stand-bys on the day.

This month's Doctor releases from Big Finish feature the continuation of the Seventh Doctor's travels with Klein and Will, an adventure for the First Doctor and Susan, plus an interview with the two actors that brought the popular Victorian investigators - aka Jago and Litefoot - to life.

Win a copy of The Alchemists

This month's competition thanks to Big Finish is to win one of five copies of The Alchemists. To be in with a chance to win, please answer the following question:
Send your answer to comp-alchemists@doctorwhonews.net with the subject line "I'm a Genius!", along with your name, address, and where you saw the competition (the news website, twitter, facebook, etc.). Only one entry per postal address will be accepted. The competition is open worldwide, and the closing date is 5th September 2013.

The 50th Anniversary audio adventure Light at the End from Big Finish is to be released in a limited edition Vinyl edition.


The Light at the End will also be available as a limited edition five-disc CD, which features:

• Discs 1 and 2 – The Light at the End
• Disc 3 – The Making of The Light at the End (70 minute documentary)
• Disc 4 – This is Doctor Who at Big Finish (70 minute documentary)
• Disc 5 – Doctor Who – The Companion Chronicles: The Revenants performed by William Russell as Ian

The Light at the End is scheduled to be released on 23rd November 2013; the standard version is currently available to pre-order via our shop.

BBC America is to show the Eighth Doctor's sole TV outing to date on Saturday 31st August.

The adventure, starring Paul McGann as the Doctor, is being aired as part of the network's ongoing series Doctor Who: The Doctors Revisited marking the show's 50th anniversary, and will be broadcast following a documentary at 8pm ET/PT in which current showrunner Steven Moffat and Daphne Ashbrook, who played Dr Grace Holloway, and Yee Jee Tso, who was Chang Lee, are among those examining what made the Eighth Doctor unique. They also discuss a new take on the Doctor's old enemy the Master, played in this story by Eric Roberts.

Co-produced by the BBC, Universal Studios, 20th Century Fox, and the American network Fox, the story, written by Matthew Jacobs and directed by Geoffrey Sax, was filmed in Canada and received its world premiere in the country on 12th May 1996, subsequently being shown in the USA two days later and in the UK on 27th May, where a dedication to Jon Pertwee was added at the end, following his death exactly a week earlier.

Intended as a pilot to revive the show after it ended in 1989, it saw the Seventh Doctor, as played by Sylvester McCoy, regenerate into the Eighth. In the story, the Master attempts to take the Doctor's remaining regenerations, plunging the Earth into chaos.

Despite impressive ratings in the UK though, the American networks didn't warm to it and options weren't taken up, with the show plunged back into the wilderness - as far as the TV version was concerned - until the BBC announced in September 2003 that it would be returning.

An exhibition of rare photos of Sophie Aldred taken during the time she played Ace opposite the Seventh Doctor on TV is to be held in London later this year.

Sophie's World, featuring hitherto-unseen images by Steven Cook, is to be hosted by Orbital Comics and Gallery, in Great Newport Street, from Thursday 5th to Monday 30th September and will be free to view.

The negatives have been missing for 22 years but high-resolution prints are currently being made from them.

A free-to-attend exhibition launch party, with Cook as the guest of honour, will be held on Thursday 5th September from 7.30pm. Meanwhile, Aldred will be signing prints at the venue on Saturday 7th September from midday to 3pm.

AudioGo's ongoing celebration of 50 Years of Doctor Who reaches the Eighth Doctor in August, with he and Charlie facing Enemy Aliens in the Destiny of the Doctor series. Meanwhile, the Seventh Doctor performs at The Greatest Show in the Galaxy in the latest Target novelisation adaptation, and the Eleventh Doctor's former compantion Amelia Pond writes about when Summer Falls in an audio adaptation of the e-book released earlier this year.

Big Finish have released details about the latest adventures for the Doctor and his companions in July.

Doctor Who: Persuasion returns former Nazi scientist Klein to the Seventh Doctor's life as the pair become embroiled in a quest for a very dangerous object. And this time there's room for another person in the TARDIS: Klein's assistant Will Arrowsmith. It stars Sylvester McCoy and sees Tracey Childs reprise her role as Klein, with Christian Edwards playing Will. It has been written by Jonathan Barnes, author of Sherlock Holmes story The Adventure of the Perfidious Mariner, and the upcoming The Ordeals of Sherlock Holmes box set.

Producer David Richardson says:


Doctor Who - The Companion Chronicles: Mastermind takes us back to the UNIT Vault and the lives of Ruth Matheson (Daphne Ashbrook) and Charlie Sato (Yee Jee Tso), guardians of its secrets. Alongside all the artefacts, though, is a highly deadly prisoner: the Master (Geoffrey Beevers). And he has a story to tell which is certainly not guaranteed to have a happy ending. Writer Jonathan Morris locks himself back into the Vault for an in-depth look at quite possibly the Doctor's most dangerous foe...

David Richardson says:


The Fourth Doctor’s second season ends with The Final Phase, in which the mysterious Cuthbert's plan for the Proxima System is reaching its climax. The Doctor and Romana have been separated. The Doctor is aiding the Proximan fight-back. Romana and K9 are prisoners of the Daleks. And as the countdown to the opening of the Quantum Gateway begins, the Daleks reveal their true intentions.

Starring Tom Baker as the Doctor, John Leeson as K9 and, sadly, for the final time Mary Tamm as the first Romana, Doctor Who: The Final Phase brings the second series of The Fourth Doctor Adventures to a shattering conclusion. It also stars David Warner and Toby Hadoke as Cuthbert and his ever-faithful sidekick Mr Dorrick, and the incomparable Nicholas Briggs as the ever-malevolent Daleks.

David Richardson says:


Finally, the second season of Counter-Measures stars Simon Williams, Pamela Salem and Karen Gledhill reprising their Doctor Who Remembrance of the Daleks roles of Gilmore, Rachel and Allison, Counter-Measures - Series Two brings four more tales of Sixties-set 'black and white' espionage, conspiracy and derring-do. It also stars Hugh Ross as the team's mysterious boss, Sir Toby Kinsella.

David Richardson says:

Win a copy of Mastermind!

This month's competition thanks to Big Finish is to win one of five copies of Mastermind. To be in with a chance to win, please answer the following question:
Send your answer to comp-mastermind@doctorwhonews.net with the subject line "You Will Obey!", along with your name, address, and where you saw the competition (the news website, twitter, facebook, etc.). Only one entry per postal address will be accepted. The competition is open worldwide, and the closing date is 31st July 2013.

Silva Screen has announced the next of its 50th Anniversary soundtrack collection on CD, with the release of the score of the final story to be recorded in the original run of Doctor Who, the Sylvester McCoy adventure Ghost Light.


The CD is due to be released on 26th August 2013.

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Also coming out on 19th August is a 12" vinyl release of the Series 1+2 album, originally released on CD in 2006. The two records include all of the tracks from the original. Meanwhile, music from the most recent television series is due to be released as a two-disc collection on CD later in the Autumn.


UPDATE - 15th AUGUST: Silva Screen has announced that because of a problem at the factory the release date of the vinyl albums has been delayed, with Monday 2nd September now the likely date.

Win a copy of Ghost Light!

Thanks to Silva Screen we have three copies of the CD for our readers to win. To be in with a chance, simply answer this question:
Please send your answer to comp-ghostlight@doctorwhonews.net with the subject line "We all have a universe of our own terrors to face", along with your name, address, and where you read about this competition. The competition is open worldwide, and the closing date will be on 24th August 2013. Only one entry per household will be accepted.

Remembrance of the Daleks is to be shown on BBC America this month as part of the channel's celebratory strand Doctor Who: The Doctors Revisited.

Airing on Saturday 27th July in omnibus form, it will be preceded by a documentary at 7pm ET/PT entitled Doctor Who: The Doctors Revisited – The Seventh Doctor, in which Sylvester McCoy, his companion actors Sophie Aldred and Bonnie Langford, plus current lead writer and executive producer Steven Moffat will be among the people examining the darker side of this particular incarnation of the Doctor. They will also be viewing some of his surreal adventures and discussing The Rani.

Remembrance of the Daleks, written by Ben Aaronovitch and directed by Andrew Morgan, was originally shown over four episodes in October 1988 and saw the Doctor return to Coal Hill School as well as the Totter's Lane junkyard first seen in the show's premier episode. In addition, it continued the story arc of the Dalek civil war, and marked the last appearance of the Daleks and Davros in the original run of the show.
BBC America is celebrating the programme's 50th anniversary by showing a story per Doctor per month.