The website of the Doctor Who Restoration Team has published information on the forthcoming DVD release of the 1989 Doctor Who serial "Battlefield". The four-part adventure, which opened the final season of classic Doctor Who, stars Sylvester McCoy as the Seventh Doctor and Sophie Aldred as his companion Ace. It is due to be released on Region 2 DVD in the UK on December the 29th.

This is the first ever commercial release of the transmitted version of the story, the VHS release having included various extended and deleted scenes edited back into the action. For this DVD release, the transmission version is presented on one disc, with a movie-format extended edition with new CGI special effects included on a second disc.

Other extras include a commentary track with Aldred, Nicholas Courtney, Angela Bruce, writer Ben Aaronovitchand script editor Andrew Cartmel; documentaries on the making of the story, BBC trailers from the time and various other features.

The website Den of Geek has published full details of the forthcoming DVD box set release of series four of Doctor Who, which is to be released next month. The article contains a full run-down of the documentary features, deleted and extended scenes and audio commentaries included on the set.

The same website has also published another article detailing information gleaned from some of the new audio commentaries. This includes the note thatDavid Tennant at one point refers to new head writer and executive producer Steven Moffat as his "new boss", which the website takes to indicate that they will be working together on the fifth series of the programme, to be broadcast in 2010.

Infomation from the BBFC website indicates the titles of four more stories due to be released on DVD in 2009.

From the First Doctor's era The Rescue and The Romans will be released as a double set. The Rescue is a two parter featuring the arrival of Maureen O'Brien as Vicki, while The Romans is a four part romp set around the court of the Emperor Nero. Both stories were first shown in 1965.

From the Sixth Doctor's era we have The Twin Dilemma which was Colin Baker's debut story, shown in 1984 and Attack of the Cybermen, first shown in 1985.

Posted By John Bowman

The Restoration Team today released details of the forthcoming DVD releases of The War Machines and Four To Doomsday.

The War Machines, which the team first looked at 11 years ago, proved to be quite a problem, and Restoration Team member Steve Roberts goes into great detail regarding the work that has been done on the story.

The feature also includes a link to the 1min 3sec "Coming Soon" trailer for The War Machines that never made it to previous DVD releases because of last-minute schedule changes.

Extras include a then-and-now comparison of locations plus related excerpts from Blue Peter.

The extras on Four To Doomsday will include material from Peter Davison's first day in the studios as the Doctor, which has come from late producer John Nathan-Turner's personal archive, Davison's Boxing Day 1980 appearance on magazine show Saturday Night At The Mill plus a theme music video featuring a new remix of Peter Howell's arrangement.

Videotape dropout had affected the studio block 1 material but otherwise it proved to be what Roberts called "a very standard restoration job".

The War Machines will be released in the UK on August 25 and Four To Doomsday on September 15.

(With thanks to Tony Clark.)

The official BBC website has announced that the forthcoming DVD release of the 1986 Sixth Doctor epic The Trial of a Time Lord has been delayed from its intended August 25th release date. It will now be released on September 29th, though no reason has been given for the delay. In its place, the First Doctor serial The War Machines starring William Hartnell, Jackie Lane, Michael Craze and Anneke Wills, will now be released on August 25th.

Also released in the same article is a a better-quality scan of the cover illustration for the forthcoming UK DVD release of the Fifth Doctor serial Four to Doomsday starring Peter Davison, Janet Fielding, Matthew Waterhouse and Sarah Sutton, which is out this autumn. The cover art was originally revealed yesterday on the Amazon.co.uk website. Click on the thumbnail image below for a larger version.

BBC Worldwide Americas have announced a pair of releases for November. The Complete Fourth Series and The Infinite Quest will both be released in North America on November 18th, 2008.

The Complete Fourth Series box-set will include Voyage of the Damned, as well as Children in Need skit Time Crash, which was not shown in North America.

The Infinite Quest will be a single disc release of the animated adventure featuring the Tenth Doctor and Martha.

TVShowsOnDVD.com has provided some information about the special features for each release. According to the site, The Complete Fourth Serieswill include cut-down versions of Doctor Who Confidential and commentaries for all episodes. The Infinite Quest will include "over 30 minutes of terrific bonus material", which is presumably the same as the features on the Region 2 release (cast interviews, David Tennant's animation test, behind-the-scenes features on the animation and voiceover, animatics of episodes and deleted scenes, character profiles and a photo gallery).

In other DVD news, a box set of the first season of The Sarah Jane Adventures will be released in North America on October 7th, 2008, and in the UK on November 10th. The set will have four discs, and will include the pilot Invasion of the Bane and all ten episodes from the program's first season. The set will include the following special features:

• Interviews with Cast and Crew
  
• Synopses for All Stories
  
• Investigating Tools: A Gadget Glossary
  
• Quiz, with Special Outtakes as Prizes
  
• A Sarah Jane Smith Video Timeline
  
• Behind-the-Scenes Footage
  
• Character and Alien Profiles
  
• Photo Galleries
  
• UK BBC TV spots
  
• Trailers
  

Cover images below are courtesy of TVShowsOnDVD.com

On Saturday, Doctor Who News featured a forthcoming schedule for Doctor Who DVD titles for North America. After receiving several queries from UK readers, following is the current forthcoming DVD schedule for the United Kingdom (Updated on July 7th with further information):
Recent UK releases (in case you haven't picked them up) included the "Beneath the Surface" Boxed Set (which included "Doctor Who and the Silurians," "The Sea Devils" and "Warriors of the Deep") on 14 January, "The Time Meddler" on 4 February, "The Five Doctors: 25th Anniversary Edition" on 3 March, "Black Orchid" on 14 April, "The Invasion of Time" on 5 May and "K9 Tales" (featuring "The Invisible Enemy" and "K9 and Company") on 16 June.

The TV Shows on DVD website has provided a preview of the latest announced DVDs for the North American market, both due in October: The Trial of a Time Lord Boxed Set, starring Colin Baker, Nicola Bryant and Bonnie Langford, and The Brain of Morbius starring Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen. The box covers for the North America (US/Canada) releases are below; click on each for a larger version. (A new version of the "Morbius" disc release has now been uploaded). The "Trial of a Time Lord" set (four discs) includes commentaries by C. Baker, Bryant, Tony Selby (Glitz), script editor Eric Saward, writers Pip & Jane Baker, director Chris Clough and others, as well as "Making Of" featurettes, deleted and extended scenes, interview features, trailers, news coverage and documentaries (and even the famous "Doctor in Distress" music video!) The "Morbius" disc includes commentaries by T. Baker, Sladen, Philip Madoc (Solon), director Christopher Barry and producer Philip Hinchcliffe, a short documentary, trailers and photos.
Recent North America releases (in case you haven't picked them up) included "The Time Warrior" and "Timelash" in April, "Planet of Evil" and "Destiny of the Daleks" before that in March, and "Torchwood: The Complete First Series" back in January.
With thanks to the Doctor Who DVD FAQ.

2 entertain, the company which produces the classic series DVDs, has confirmed there is an authoring error with the latest release, The Invisible Enemy, out this week as part of the K9-Tales disc set. The error is towards the end of Episode Three and causes the disc to skip part of the episode.

2 entertain will replace all faulty discs and have set up a helpline which will be active from Monday. Customers with faulty discs are advised to either emaildvd.support@bbc.co.uk (NOTE CORRECTED ADDRESS!) or call 020 7612 3186. Instructions on what to do are on the voicemail of the phone line and on the auto reply from the email.

The current DVD release schedule is listed below. Schedule is not confirmed and may change.

• 16 June - K9 Tales
• 21 July - The Brain of Morbius
• 18 August - Trial of a Time Lord
• September - Four to Doomsday
• October - The War Machines
• November - Battlefield