The Great Detective, the prequel to the Doctor Who Christmas Episode, shown as part of the BBC's Children in Need programme, was watched by 6.3 million viewers, according to unofficial overnight viewing figures.

The trail for the upcoming episode, The Snowmen, which aired an hour later, was watched by 8.6 million viewers, out-rating Coronation Street on ITV1.

Doctor Who is once again up for one of the American People's Choice Awards after making it on to the 2013 short list of nominees for Favorite Sci-Fi/Fantasy TV Show.

It faces competition from Once Upon A Time, Supernatural (which beat Doctor Who last year in the same category), The Vampire Diaries, and The Walking Dead. The nominees for all 48 categories in the CBS awards show honouring TV, film, and music were announced yesterday at The Paley Center in Beverly Hills.

People can vote as often they like until Thursday 13th December, and the award winners will be revealed on CBS on Wednesday 9th January 2013.

Live+7 figures are now available for the series of Doctor Who episodes shown in September.

The Live+7 figures give the total numbers viewing a programme within a week of transmission, including all watching on PVR, transmission repeats and on iPlayer.

Each Doctor Who episode increased its audience by an average of 52% from the initial overnight figure, a much larger increase than achieved by the average BBC One drama, which had a 25% increase. Just under 10% of viewers watched on iPlayer, with the vast majority of iPlayer viewers time-shifting the programme.

With an average increase of 3.07 million, Doctor Who has the second-largest average increase for Drama in 2012, just being beaten by Steven Moffat's other series, Sherlock, which increased each episode by an average of 3.34 million viewers. Doctor Who has the largest percentage increase for Drama for the year so far.

Title	First Run	Live+7	increase	First Run	Repeats	Time Shift	i Player
Asylum of the Daleks	6.39m	9.65m	51%	66%	4%	20%	10%
Dinosaurs on a Spaceship	5.43m	8.64m	59%	63%	5%	23%	9%
A Town Called Mercy	6.49m	9.22m	42%	70%	2%	20%	7%
The Power of Three	5.59m	8.68m	55%	64%	3%	24%	8%
The Angels Take Manhattan	5.86m	8.92m	52%	66%	3%	22%	9%

Current Filming:

Filming commenced this week on episode 7 (2013 #2), written by Neil Cross and directed by Farren Blackburn, who announced on Sunday: "Once more unto the breach! Start filming Neil Cross's latest Doctor Who ep tomorrow. Gonna be a ride!!!" Filming is due to continue until the 6th November on the episode, which appears to be set in the early 1980s - though no guest stars have been announced for this episode so far. Filming kicked off in Newport on Monday, with eagle-eyed viewers possibly recognising the Gaer estate from Torchwood: Children of Earth back in 2009; another old haunt from previous stories was the nearby St. Woolos Cemetery, which was used on Tuesday. Blackburn commented: "Several coffees a day keeps the Doctor at play. Boy you need energy to direct this show!!! « BTW the Doc is looking cooler than EVER!!! « When I say The Doc is looking cooler than EVER!! I mean what he's wearing!!! Just wait and see!!! «"

The bulk of episode six (2012 #1) by Steven Moffat has been completed, with a high-profile shoot in London taking place last week incorporating motorcycle antics on the South Bank and around Westminster streets, plus scenes in the shadow of the Shard near to London Bridge. Some pickups also took place on Wednesday back in Cardiff, with director Colm McCarthy wryly commenting: "Five cameras on a corner of a street in Cardiff shooting Dr Who for an hour. Nobody has noticed yet. Too late Whovians! We're out of here."

Thursday evening saw filming by Barry Pump House with director Saul Metzstein present - this seems likely to have been pickups for the Mark Gatiss story (2013 #6) that stars Dame Diana Rigg and Rachael Stirling - though the scene in question features another character, familiar to regular viewers... Main filming back at the BBC Studios during the day was briefly interrupted to celebrate Matt Smith's birthday (he'll be 30 on Sunday) - the cake surprise is available to watch via the BBC's Doctor Who website.

Neil Gaiman's script (2012 #7) has its readthrough next week, with the writer saying: "in case you are wondering: I'm really a bit nervous: the table read of my episode of Doctor Who is next week. Think good thoughts at us. I'll try and post some photographs afterwards. Oh, and for the curious, the episode will be called ███ ████ ████████ . Only with letters instead of Ascii Blocks. Unless we change the title again before it's broadcast. Which might well happen, actually. I mean, it was originally called █ █████████ ██ ██████." [Neil Gaiman's Journal, 25 Oct 2012]

Ashley Walters (who guest-stars in the fifth episode next year) spoke about his co-stars from his recent stint filming for the series: "You can't beat being in Doctor Who - it's something I've grown up with my whole life and working with Matt Smith was amazing. He's a really, really good actor and just being a part of that huge BBC franchise was an incredible thing. And Jenna Louise Coleman is really good at what she does - it seems like she's enjoying her job and I loved working with her." [Radio Times, 22 Oct 2012]

The Radio Times also reports that the fifth episode is intriguingly entitled Journey To The Centre Of The TARDIS - however, episode titles won't be finalised until closer to transmission (for example this year's The Power of Three was originally entitled Cubed).

London MCM Expo: Q&A:

Matt Smith and Caroline Skinner participated in a Q&A at the London MCM Expo taking place at the Excel Centre in order to promote The Series 7 Part 1 boxed set, and answered a variety of questions about the series both shown and still to be broadcast. The session was streamed live, and will be made available to watch on YouTube next week.

Into the Future: re-occuring roles:

Steven Moffat has re-iterated that Amy won't be back for the 50th Anniversary, in spite of recent media speculation: "Amy and Rory won’t be back. At the very beginning, when I was talking to Karen, I said, 'Let's make it a proper ending'. Heaven knows if they will appear in some flashback – I have no plans – but the story of Amy and Rory is over." [Mirror, The Sun, 15 Oct 2012]

If he were to return, John Simm would like to take the Master in a different direction: "I'd love to have another take on him, to be a bit quieter. Russell T Davies had a specific idea of what he wanted him to be like. So I just had to do exactly what he wanted me to, and he wanted a giggling lunatic. There's a new writer now, and I'm sure his take on him would be different so I'd be interested to have a look at it. I'd like to take the Master to a very, very dark place." [Radio Times, 23 Oct 2012]

Matt Smith confirmed at the MCM Expo in answer to a question that he'd expect that - should the Master ever return - he'd expect it to be played by John Simm! Both he and Caroline Skinner indicated that Alex Kingston would also be back as River Song (though not exactly when!).

Former Doctor Who lead writer Russell T Davies wants to be surprised by next year: "I think I’d be like the ghost at the feast, what would I do – turn up and make the tea? I have asked current boss Steven Moffat not to tell me what they are planning." [What's on TV, 24 Oct 2012]

Into the Future: alternative Doctors?

Actor Stephen Mangan wants to add his name to the list of Doctors: "I'd love to be Doctor Who – who wouldn't, it's a great part, it's very exciting, I think the Doctor Whos we've had recently have been phenomenal and I'm glad I wasn't the one who had to follow David Tennant because he was extraordinary." [Radio Times, 12 Oct 2012]

Comedian Russ Noble wouldn't ignore it either: "I think anyone would cancel anything to be [The Doctor]! The weird thing about Doctor Who is, I think there isn’t a human being on the planet who would say no to Doctor Who. But the only downside of that is you’d have to live in Cardiff!" [Den of Geek, 22 Oct 2012]

Into the Future: location, location location!

After the more 'exotic' locations visited for the first part of the series, Caroline Fisher said that they sadly weren't travelling that far from Cardiff Bay for the current batch of stories being recorded. However, when asked by the audience the the London MCM Expo about the possibility of filming in places like Louisiana in the United States, or in Australia (as championed by MP George Christensen) she didn't rule either out in the future.

Having recently stirred the hornet's nest over Australian filming himself, Matt Smith throws a few more locations into the mix: "I also think you could make quite a fun episode in Iceland or South America, or you could go to Peru. I'd like to film something in those places. The Pyramids would be fun, too, but I'd rather go to Peru." [BANG Showbiz, 18 Oct 2012]

... so asks Mike Rugnetta on the latest episode of Idea Channel, the weekly web programme from PBS Digital Studios.

A range of Doctor Who homeware products has been launched by BBC Worldwide.

Called Doctor Who Home and created by design partner Skew & Rude, it has Daleks, Cybermen, and the TARDIS emblazoned on a total of 14 products, including jugs, mugs, cups, teapots, cards, notepads, and gift wrap, as well as textiles and kitchen accessories. They will be available in shops from the end of next month.

David Wilson-Nunn, the creative director of BBC Worldwide, led the appointment to exploit a perceived gap in the market for 16-to-60-year-old fans, having previously worked with Skew & Rude on strategic work for the programme. He said the TARDIS graphic, which is featured on boxed card packaging, was "like a secondary brand logo for us – the one thing that never changes and something we can use across everything".

Abi Williams, the founder and director of Skew & Rude, said the designs had been created by "vectorising images and then developing block colour work and playing with shapes across product ranges". She added: "We're working on the next season to follow this collection. We want to push the design as far as possible and have two fantastic concepts for a product brand."

UK digital PVR producer YouView have launched a new advert to promote their broadband content service, which enables purchasers to watch a variety of digital channels and catch up via the BBC iPlayer, ITV Player, 4OD and Demand 5.

The advert showcases a number of shows including Sherlock, Alan Carr, Noddy, and Downton Abbey, as well as documentaries and sport. Doctor Who is also prominent, represented by a Dalek patrol being screened approaching along a street.

The Doctor Who Adventure Game The Gunpowder Plot triumphed at this evening's BAFTA Cymru Awards.

It won the Digital Creativity And Games prize, with the combined effort of the BBC Wales Interactive Team, Sumo Digital, and Revolution Software beating Becoming Human and Coridor 5.

However, both Doctor Who and The Sarah Jane Adventures lost out in all the categories for which they had been nominated.

The Impossible Astronaut, which opened Series 6 of Doctor Who, was beaten to the Television Drama title by Shirley, the BBC Two production directed by Colin Teague and with music by Ben Foster that charted the rise to fame of Shirley Bassey, and the Series 6 finale The Wedding of River Song, which was up for a gong in the Sound category, was trumped by the Matthew Rhys film Patagonia. Meanwhile, The Curse of Clyde Langer, from the fifth and final series of The Sarah Jane Adventures, saw the Children's Programme title go to S4C's Dim Byd.

Also missing out were Eve Myles for Actress in Baker Boys and Helen Raynor, who was co-nominated (with Gary Owen) for the Writer prize, again for Baker Boys. Those categories went to, respectively, Sharon Morgan for the film Resistance and Eddie Butler for Lions '71.

Tonight's ceremony was hosted by Alex Jones at the Millennium Centre in Cardiff.

Voting has now opened for the eighteenth National Television Awards, and as per the norm Doctor Who and its stars have been nominated for awards.

The show itself has been nominated for the Drama category, but is up against a formidable number of shows this year, with some 35 to choose from. The list includes the other Steven Moffat success Sherlock, BBC medical stalwarts Casualty and Holby City, Merlin, and last Christmas's showpiece drama Great Expectations. ITV1's contributions include Lewis, Whitechapel, Law & Order UK and last year's winner Downton Abbey.

Matt Smith is up for Drama Performance: Male; there are 29 nominations in this category, which include Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman (Sherlock), Kevin Whately (Lewis) and Sir Kenneth Branagh (Wallander). Other Who-related nominees include Marc Warren (Without You), Colin Morgan (Merlin), Hugh Bonneville (Downton Abbey), Daniel Mays (Mrs Biggs), and Martin Clunes (A Mother's Son).

Karen Gillan has slightly less to contend with for the Drama Performance: Female, with "just" 25 nominees, including Gillian Anderson (Great Expectations), Claire Danes (Homeland) and Emilia Fox (Silent Witness). Other Who-related names include Lesley Sharp and Suranne Jones (Scott and Bailey), and Sunetra Sarker (Casualty).

Who-related actors in other categories include Nina Wadia (Eastenders) in Serial Drama Performance, and Alexander Armstrong, Reggie Yates and Bradley Walsh as Entertainment Presenter.


Voting for the awards is made by the public, and takes place until Thursday 11th October. Up to four nominees from each of the categories with the most votes will then go forward to be included in the shortlist voting round (date to be announced). The ceremony itself will take place live from the O2 on ITV1 on 23rd January 2013.

This year's MediaGuardian 100 continues to rank Steven Moffat amongst the industry's most powerful and influential people, with Doctor Who's lead writer and executive producer placed at number 87, up five places from his chart entry last year at 92.


BBC executives that have an influence on Doctor Who's future in the list include the new Director General George Entwistle in fourth place (last year 26), and BBC1 Controller Danny Cohen at number 13 (last year 14).


The Media 100 has been compiled every year since 2001 by the Guardian, and is a list of who they consider are currently the most powerful people in the UK media. Candidates for the list are judged on cultural influence, economic clout and political power over the course of the last year.