The BBC have confirmed that UK viewers will get their first look at the new series of Doctor Who this coming Sunday, with an exclusive new trailer shown during the BBC coverage of the World Cup final.

Doctor Who Preview

William Hughes, the actor who played the Master as a young boy, has died at the age of 20.

William Hughes played The Master in the 2007 story The Sound of Drums. At the age of eight, he was the youngest actor to play the renegade Time Lord. He also appeared in the 2008 Torchwood story Sleeper.

Hughes, from Mumbles in Swansea, Wales, gave up acting shortly after appearing in Doctor Who. His interests turned to Boxing, joining the Bonymaen ABC boxing gym in Swansea.

Fighting for the club he won 3 Welsh titles, before winning gold and bronze at the Great Britain championships. He won Gold at the 2017/18 British Universities and Colleges Sports Championships.

He was described as tremendously talented by former World Champion boxer Enzo Maccarinelli, who mentored the young athlete. Hughes studied at Bishop Vaughan Catholic School in Swansea, where he was described as an exceptionally talented sportsman. Hughes had just completed he first year of a finance degree at Queen Mary University in London. It is believed he died on 9th July while on holiday on the Greek island of Corfu. A spokesman for the Foreign & Commonwealth Office confirmed their staff were supporting the family of a British man following his death in Corfu and were in contact with the Greek and UK police.

BBC Studios have revealed the first of the new toy ranges for Doctor Who Season 11. Ahead of San Diego Comic-Con (SDCC), this is the first-look of the new Thirteenth Doctor figurines.

Doctor Who licensee Titan have produced two limited-edition 6.5” vinyls collectibles for S11: one 6.5" Thirteenth Doctor TITAN, and one 6.5" Thirteenth Doctor Kawaii TITAN, both of which will be debuting at SDCC 2018 at BBC AMERICA booth #4129 and Titan Entertainment booth #5537.

Remaining TITANS post-SDCC will be available to buy after the close of Comic-Con from Hot Topic & the BBC Shop in the US and from Forbidden Planet in the UK. Pre-order for these potential store purchases opens after the close of San Diego Comic-Con on Monday 23rd July 2018.

From Funko, The Thirteenth Doctor Pop! and The Thirteenth Doctor Rock Candy will be available to see at SDCC 2018 on the BBC AMERICA booth #4129 and the Funko booth #5341/5347, and in retail in both the US and UK this autumn. A new Doctor also means a new costume and Her Universe is debuting the Thirteenth Doctor’s fashionable rainbow striped top, long coat, and blue trousers, which will be available at SDCC at Her Universe booth #1321 and later in the autumn at Hot Topic stores.

Away from SDCC, UK Master Toy Licensee Character Options has unveiled its brand new Doctor Who figure, the first 10” figure of the Thirteenth Doctor, played by Jodie Whittaker.

The new, highly detailed 10”/26cm fully articulated, collectible figure comes dressed in real fabric high-waisted culottes, rainbow striped dark blue shirt and coat. The figure also comes with the Doctor’s essential Sonic Screwdriver accessory.

Alasdair Dewar, Character Options’ Director of Product Development commented: Rikesh Desai, Licensing Director at BBC Studios, says; The new figure will be available from August, for more information visit www.character-online.com.

BBC AMERICA will hold a panel at SDCC on Thursday, 19th July at 11:45am PT in Hall H, introducing the Thirteenth Doctor, played by Jodie Whittaker. Marking a new era for the legendary Time Lord, Whittaker will be joined on the panel by two of her Doctor Who co-stars, Tosin Cole and Mandip Gill, who play Ryan and Yasmin, as well as award-winning series showrunner Chris Chibnall (Broadchurch) and executive producer Matt Strevens (An Adventure In Space And Time). BBC AMERICA will also have additional exclusive Doctor Who merchandise from BBC Shop available at booth #4129.

This week sees the release of the first in a series of Titan Comics leading up to the arrival of the Thirteenth Doctor.

The first, in a series of three, features the Tenth Doctor, as portrayed by David Tennant.

It is available from Wednesday 11 July.

The Road To The Thirteenth Doctor: The Tenth Doctor

Writer: James Peaty, Jody Houser

Artist: Iolanda Zanfardino, Rachael Stott

Colourist: Enrica Eren Angiolini

Doctor Who: The Collection – Season 12, the Blu-ray set of stories from Tom Baker's first series of Doctor Who, has entered the charts as the UK's second best selling Blu-ray for the week.

The Blu-ray features the first five stories of the fourth Doctor, including The Ark in Space and Genesis of the Daleks. The Doctor is accompanied by Sarah Jane Smith (Elisabeth Sladen) and Harry Sullivan (Ian Marter) and was first broadcast between December 1974 and May 1975. The set included a new interview with Tom Baker as well as several brand new features.

The charts are compiled by Official Charts based on sales across the seven day period from 1st - 7th July 2018. Doctor Who was only beaten in sales by the Marvel Film Black Panther.

Candy Jar Books has released the latest in its range of free-for-download short stories in their Lethbridge-Stewart series:


The short story is available from Candy Jar website.

The first indication that Doctor Who will have a Christmas episode this year has come thanks to an entry on the CV of the programme's editor.

Doctor Who will return this autumn with a special 65-minute episode, followed by nine 50 minute episodes. Until now there has been no indication as to whether the production team would be making an extra episode to be shown at Christmas.

However, an entry in the online CV of Edel McDonnell, an editor on the programme, indicated he will be working on a Christmas special to be directed by Wayne Yip, who previously directed the twelfth Doctor episodes The Lie Of The Land and Empress Of Mars.

Production Guide

The BBC has gone to court to try to obtain details to identify the individual responsible for leaking clips from Jodie Whittaker's first full episode as The Doctor.

Last week a 53 second clip, thought to be from the debut episode of the new series, was released unofficially online. The clip has since been removed by BBC Worldwide.

The BBC has confirmed it has requested a clerk at the California federal court issue a subpoena to Tapatalk, a mobile community platform in the United States, in order to get information allowing them to identify the source of the leak.

A spokesman for BBC Studios said The unfinished clip had temporary music and had not gone through the grading process which determines the final visual look of the scene.

Doctor Who has been plagued by leaks ever since it returned in 2005 when footage from Rose was released via a Canadian third party company. In that case the individual responsible for the leak had their employment terminated.

A leak 2013 was more embarrassing for the Corporation, when BBC Worldwide released the US Blu-Ray disc of the season climax before it had aired on television.

Doctor Who is due to return to screens this Autumn.

A new date has been added to the schedule of comedian Rob Lloyd's Doctor Who themed one man show, Who Me!

This Tuesday the show will come to The Broadway Theatre in Peterborough.

Remaining Dates

• Peterborough 3rd July
• Chipping Norton 4 July 
• Norwich 5 July 
• Salford 7 July 
• Inverness 8 July

The latest edition of the podcast From the Archive: A British Television, produced in association with Kaleidoscope, the nonprofit organisation that recovers and stores classic television programmes, focuses on the new Doctor Who Season 12 Blu-ray set.

Doctor Who has an established history of DVD sets full of extras and documentaries about the series’ past. Now, as classic Doctor Who enters the realm of Blu-ray sets by season, how do they top themselves?

In this episode of From the Archive: A British Television Podcast, Greg Bakun takes a look at how the team led by Russell Minton decided to evolve the range to not only make it more appealing to fans but unleash the floodgates of archive material never made available to the public before now.

Bakun talks to Russell Minton about his vision for these sets, Richard Bignell about the research and work that went into providing the loads of archive material to this set that has never been available to fans before now, Ed Stradling about updating old documentaries and making new ones for this set, and Derek Handley who not only talks about the work that goes into the photo galleries but also the BBC Photographic Library and his work tracking down photos we have not seen before for the sets.

The podcast also includes Stephen Cranford who was a close friend to Graham Strong who recently passed away. Graham gave fans the gift of crystal clear audio recordings to many missing Doctor Who episodes and the podcast pays tribute to his legacy and finds out more about who Graham was.

The Podcast can be found here.

Feedback or questions on the podcast or general inquiries can be sent to feedback@fromthearchive.co.uk.