The BBC have released a new trailer to promote the forthcoming return of Doctor Who to BBC One on 30th March 2013, featuring a number of guest stars, villains and monsters to appear over the course of the eight weeks.



The trailer premiered on BBC One Wales before the Six Nations rugby match between Wales and England, and was broadcast in all regions this evening after Pointless Celebrities.

BBC America are also to broadcast a trailer for the series tonight - this features different scenes to the one by the BBC, and can currently be viewed online via Entertainment Weekly.

It has been announced that Comic Relief has so far raised £75,107,851 - the highest amount raised on the night by the charity fundraiser in its 25 years!

As usual, the evening's programme featured a host of especially recorded sketches featuring popular series characters, which has often included appearances or "minisodes" related to Doctor Who. This year saw the Doctor pop up in One Born Every Minute, a scene with the cast from Call The Midwife where he arrives to warn an expectant mother of the potential threat caused by her unborn twins, John and Edward ... Matt Smith then appeared on stage at BBC Television Centre as a 'preview' to the 3D 50th Anniversary Special, though ended up having to fend off the attentions of presenter Claudia Winkleman.

Later in the evening, Davina promised co-presenter John Bishop a kiss the same way she had received from David Tennant during the 2009 evening - and the actor was on hand to give John a surprise!


The high-definition Call the Midwife sketch is available to purchase via Apple iTunes. The followup encounter between Matt and Devina has been publised by Comic Relief on YouTube. A number of other related videos can be viewed below:

Sunday 17th March sees the broadcast of the four-part 1972/73 Jon Pertwee story The Three Doctors in Australia and New Zealand. The story is the 11th instalment in the 50th Anniversary season of classic Doctor Who stories on the UKTV channel.

The story is scheduled in New Zealand at 4:15pm and in Australia at 4:30pm. New Zealand gets an additional screening on Monday 18th March at 4:00am.

The Three Doctors was first broadcast in Australia in 1973. New Zealand got to see it in 1975.

The UKTV billing describes the story as follows:

A gel-like plasma creature arrives on Earth & hunts down the Doctor, who calls on the Time Lords for help. They then send the Doctor's earlier selves to join him.

UKTV is showing stories every week throughout the year in the lead-up to the anniversary in November. The Three Doctors is the third in a set of four stories featuring Jon Pertwee's Doctor scheduled to screen in March. The next story is Death to the Daleks (24th March). No story is scheduled on the last Sunday of this month.

Next month UKTV will present six Tom Baker stories in four weeks: The Ark in Space (7th April), Genesis of the Daleks (14th April), Pyramids of Mars and The Hand of Fear (21st April), and The Robots of Death and City of Death (28th April).

Up-and-coming broadcasts from both 20th and 21st Century series of Doctor Who can be found via UKTV's Doctor Who sections  for Australia and New Zealand.

Both Matt Smith and David Tennant are appearing in this year's Red Nose Day broadcast - though whether they appear together remains to be seen. The Comic Relief charity event marks its 25th anniversary this year, and is one of the final programmes to be broadcast from BBC Television Centre, which closes this month. [BBC One, from 7:00pm, Fri 15 Mar]



Matt was a guest on the Chris Evans Breakfast Show this morning, talking about the return of Doctor Who on Easter Saturday (in which he also confirms the title of The Crimson Horror with Diana Rigg), working on the series in Cardiff, abd the 3D 50th Anniversary - but wouldn't be drawn on whether other Doctors would be involved! [BBC Radio Two, from 6:30am, Fri 15 Mar]

Earlier in the week the actor was the subject of Meet the Star, a regular event at London's Apple Store; interviewed by Boyd Hilton, he spoke about the forthcoming run of episodes (confirming the title of The Hider in the House (but subsequently officially renamed Hide) with Dougray Scott) and the 50th Anniversary special (which he'd read the day before). A video of the event should be made available soon via iTunes.

Matt continues his media frenzy tomorrow, where he will be a guest on The Jonathan Ross Show. [ITV, from 9:20pm, Sat 16 Mar]

Catch-up:

• Presenter Richard Bacon visited Roath Lock Studios in Cardiff on his Afternoon Show on Monday afternoon, where he spoke to a number of those involved with shows made there, including Doctor Who where he also met up with Jenna-Louise Coleman - part of her chat is available to listed to via the BBC website. [BBC Radio Five Live, from 2:00pm, Mon 11 Mar]
  
• Minna Kane and her team of young hackers from Cracking The Code take a visit to The Mill, where Cat Harries uses the Dalek Parliament from Asylum of the Daleks to demonstrate how the visual effects of Doctor Who are made. The scene has been made available as a clip on the BBC website. [BBC Two, from 5:00am, Thu 14 Mar]
  
• K9 (aka John Leeson) narrates an edition of documentary series My Life, which in this episode follows 10-year-old Ethan, a keen Doctor Who fan who, despite being deaf, loves music and set up his own rock band. [CBBC, 5:45pm, Tue 5 Mar]
  

The Caves of Androzani is to be shown by the BFI to represent the Fifth Doctor's era in its Doctor Who At 50 season, it announced today.

Written by Robert Holmes and directed by Graeme Harper, the four-part adventure - which first aired in March 1984 - saw the final regular appearance of Peter Davison as the Doctor.

The "regeneration" adventure will be shown on the big screen at BFI Southbank on Saturday 4th May, as reported earlier this week, with the start time for the event now confirmed as 2pm. The names of the guests for the accompanying panel discussion will be announced nearer the time.

Dates for when tickets go on sale are also yet to be announced. BFI Champions get first pick, followed by standard members and then the general public. So far, all the events in the celebratory season have sold out to BFI members in advance of tickets being released to the public, but returns and stand-bys are possible.

BBC Worldwide have confirmed the special features for the forthcoming release of Inferno (Special Edition) on DVD. The two-disc set has been provisionally scheduled for release on the 27th May for R2, and on the 5th June for R4 (a R1 release date has yet to be confirmed).

The Mind of Evil:

Following Inferno is the last Pertwee adventure to premiere on DVD - but the first time it has been seen in colour for over three and a half decades! The Mind of Evil is currently scheduled for release in the United Kingdom on 3rd June, and the BBFC have recently classified features that will accompany the story:

Commentaries (1-3):
00:24:41:08 DOCTOR WHO - THE MIND OF EVIL - EPISODE ONE (WITH AUDIO COMMENTARY)
00:24:33:04 DOCTOR WHO - THE MIND OF EVIL - EPISODE TWO (WITH AUDIO COMMENTARY)
00:24:33:13 DOCTOR WHO - THE MIND OF EVIL - EPISODE THREE (WITH AUDIO COMMENTARY)
Commentaries (4-6):
00:24:40:21 DOCTOR WHO - THE MIND OF EVIL - EPISODE FOUR (WITH AUDIO COMMENTARY)
00:23:34:16 DOCTOR WHO - THE MIND OF EVIL - EPISODE FIVE (WITH AUDIO COMMENTARY)
00:24:39:21 DOCTOR WHO - THE MIND OF EVIL - EPISODE SIX (WITH AUDIO COMMENTARY)
00:00:23:10 THE MIND OF EVIL - RESTORATION CREDITS
DVD Extras:
00:22:41:23 THE MILITARY MIND - MAKING THE MIND OF EVIL
00:07:04:23 NOW & THEN - THE LOCATIONS OF THE MIND OF EVIL
00:04:53:21 THE MIND OF EVIL - PHOTO GALLERY
00:23:59:13 BEHIND THE SCENES

The Behind The Scenes has been reported to be a segment from an educational series, which in this episode focusses on twenty-four hours at BBC Television Centre and includes sets from The Mind of Evil.

The story was premiered last weekend at the BFI (see our review for more details), and will also be shown as part of the the Birmingham Flatpack Festival on 30th March, and at the Belfast Film Festival on 18th April. Following its release, a signing for both The Mind of Evil and Inferno will take place in London on the 8th June - see the Fantom Films website for more details.

A brief description of the colourisation process and a selection of stills by Stuart Humphryes from the first episode can be seen via his Babelcolour website.

Coming Soon:

The BBFC have classified "Coming Soon" trailers for the forthcoming stories: Inferno (1m2s); The Mind of Evil (1m12s); Terror of the Zygons (1m9s); and The Green Death (1m22s). Though scheduled for later in the year, the trailer for The Ice Warriors appeared on the just released The Aztecs Special Edition (reviewed here).

The Underwater Menace:

Frazer Hines mentions in the current issue of Doctor Who Magazine that whilst visiting BBC Television Centre for filming of Pointless Celebrities (to be broadcast on the 23rd March), the previous time he had visited the 'home' of the BBC was to record a commentary which he believes to have been for The Underwater Menace; last year special sound recordist Brian Hodgson had also suggested he'd recorded a commentary for the story.

Episode Two of the story, recovered in 2011, is the only remaining episode of classic Doctor Who yet to be formally scheduled for released on DVD (episode three was released in 2004's Lost in Time DVD boxed set).

Doctor Who: 50th Anniversary Board Game:

Whilst not strictly speaking a part of the main release range, some 100 clips from Doctor Who running to 74m28s have been passed by the BBC for the forthcoming 50th Anniversary Board Game.

A video of the guest panel at last month's screening of The Tomb of the Cybermen at the BFI has been uploaded to the organisation's YouTube channel.

The event, marking the Second Doctor's era, was held on 9th February as part of the BFI's Doctor Who At 50 season, and the discussion saw director Michael Ferguson and actors Anneke Wills, Bernard Holley, Deborah Watling, Shirley Cooklin, and Michael Kilgarriff in conversation with season co-curator Justin Johnson about working with Patrick Troughton.


The next event takes place on Saturday 20th April, marking the Fourth Doctor's era, and will be a screening of The Robots of Death, with Tom Baker, Louise Jameson, and Philip Hinchcliffe as guests. Although it is currently sold out, returns and stand-bys are possible.

It will be followed on Saturday 4th May with a screening in honour of the Fifth Doctor, with the story title and guests for that event yet to be announced.

BBC Worldwide have released their latest in a series of interviews with the writers of the Puffin e-Books to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of Doctor Who, with the third instalment The Spear of Destiny, written by Marcus Sedgewick, due to be published on 23rd March. The author chats about his love of the Third Doctor and his fright of the Master, the influence of the Vikings on British culture, what he would do if he could travel in the TARDIS, and why he thinks the Doctor has proved so popular in the last 50 years.



An excerpt from the e-book can be read via The Guardian.

Details are available for the fourth release in BBC AudioGo's Destiny of the Doctor series, due out in April. It stars Lalla Ward, who played the second on-screen incarnation of Romana.


The third in the series, Vengeance of the Stones with Richard Franklin, is out now.

The BBC has announced that Doctor Who's Executive producer Caroline Skinner is leaving the show to join BBC Drama Production in London.

Skinner will leave at the end of the current series. She took over the executive role for the production of the 2011 Christmas episode, The Doctor, The Widow and the Wardrobe and has been responsible for 15 episodes of the series.

Speaking about her departure Skinner said The current Head of Drama at BBC Wales, Faith Penhale, will be undertaking the role of executive producer on the 50th Anniversary episode of Doctor Who, due to be screened in the Autumn. Penhale paid tribute to Skinner's work on Doctor Who: Skinner will continue working on BBC Two's one-off drama An Adventure In Space and Time which forms part of the BBC's celebrations to mark the 50th Anniversary.

The recruitment process for a new executive producer for the 34th series of the show will start shortly.