K9 Logo RevealedBookmark and Share

Friday, 27 February 2009 - Reported by DWNP Archive
Posted By John Bowman

The new logo for spin-off series K9 has been revealed.

Paul Tams, the show's co-creator and co-associate producer, told The Doctor Who News Page: "As eagle-eyed people may spot, I based the new logo on K9's old-type font of Westminster, with an update. The font is also used on K9's new body."

Principal photography on the series is due to finish on May 7 and the show should air on Network Ten in Australia at some point in 2009. The electronic dog - described by Tams as "sleek and different from any previous images seen on the net, etc" - will be on screen as an animatronic prop and in CGI form.




FILTER: - K9

"Fendahl" DVD released in AprilBookmark and Share

Thursday, 26 February 2009 - Reported by R Alan Siler
As previously announced on the news page, the classic Doctor Who series adventure Image of the Fendahl, starring Tom Baker and Louise Jameson, will be released on Region 2 DVD (UK), with the now-confirmed date of release ofApril 6th. Meanwhile, a full listing of extras for the DVD have now been issued:
  • Commentary -- With actors Tom Baker, Louise Jameson, Wanda Ventham and Edward Arthur.
  • After Image -- cast and crew look back at the making of the story. With actors Louise Jameson, Edward Arthur, Wanda Ventham, script editor Anthony Read, visual effects designer Colin Mapson.
  • Deleted and Extended Scenes
  • Trailer
  • Photo Gallery
  • Coming Soon
  • Easter Egg
  • Radio Times Listings
  • Programme subtitles
  • Subtitle Production Notes




FILTER: - Blu-ray/DVD

Doctor Who Adventures #104Bookmark and Share

Thursday, 26 February 2009 - Reported by Chuck Foster
The newest issue of Doctor Who Adventures, issue #104 comes with a bumper Cyber pack -- with two different Cyber sets to choose from. One set includes a sinister Cyberleader mask and the other includes a Cybershade mask as seen in the last Doctor Who special. Both come with two different sets of Cyber badges, two sticker sheets and a massive double-sided poster of Dalek creator Davros on one side and the Doctor and Donna on the other.

Also in the magazine is an interview with "the plucky girl who helped fight those Cyber terrors at Christmas -- actress Velile Tshabalala who played Rosita," as well as posters (a Clockwork Robot, Rosita, a deadly Dalek and a stomping Cyberman), news, a "little Bannakaffalatta for you to colour in," "part of our competition to win a bony Sycorax head, and loads of other goodies" plus other items. Doctor Who Adventures issue 104 is out now.




FILTER: - Magazines - DWA

Awards: effects win, Tennant nominatedBookmark and Share

Thursday, 26 February 2009 - Reported by Josiah Rowe
Doctor Who has won an international award for its special effects, and David Tennant has been doubly nominated for the Broadcasting Press Guildawards.

The Visual Effects Society, an international organization of visual effects professionals, nominated Doctor Who in two categories this year. Simon WickersCharlie BennettTim Barter and Arianna Lago won the award for "Outstanding Matte Paintings in a Broadcast Program or Commercial" for their work on "Silence in the Library" (click thumbnail below for example). Doctor Who has been previously nominated several times for VES awards, but this is the first time it has won; historically, the awards have generally gone to North American productions.

The team at the Mill were also nominated for "Outstanding Visual Effects in a Broadcast Miniseries, Movie or Special", but lost to the HBO miniseries "John Adams". The full list of nominees for the 7th Annual VES Awards are here; the list of winners is here.

In other awards news, David Tennant has been nominated twice in the Best Actor category of the Broadcasting Press Guild Awards, selected by journalists who write about TV and radio. Tennant is nominated both for his role as the Doctor and for his performance as astrophysicist Arthur Eddington in the BBC/HBO coproduction "Einstein and Eddington", which has also been nominated for Best Single Drama. The winners will be announced on 27 March. Further details are available at the Broadcasting Press Guild website and from the Guardian.

Thanks to "PolyG" of the Doctor Who Forum.




FILTER: - David Tennant - Awards/Nominations

The Next Doctor in CanadaBookmark and Share

Monday, 23 February 2009 - Reported by Marcus
As noted in This Week in Doctor Who, the 2008 Christmas special comes to Canada in March when The Next Doctor is shown on the SPACE channel. The episode is scheduled to be shown on Saturday 14th March at 9pmEastern Time.

Previous episodes of the series have been shown on CBC. SPACE has also acquired the Canadian broadcast rights toTorchwood. The channel can be seen on satellite on Bell TV and Star Choice and is available on most Canadian cable systems.




FILTER: - Canada - Specials - Series 4/30 Specials - Broadcasting

Torchwood comic strip onlineBookmark and Share

Friday, 20 February 2009 - Reported by Chuck Foster
To tie in with the broadcast of Series Two of Torchwood on UK digital channel Watch, the broadcaster has teamed up with Torchwood Magazineto present a special online comic strip.

Ice Monsters sees Captain Jack and the Torchwood team battling Ice Monster creatures who have the ability to change the weather. It is written by Torchwood's script editor/assistant producer Brian Minchin and illustrated by former Doctor Who Magazine comic artist Adrian Salmon.

You can find the comic strip on the UKTV Watch website.




FILTER: - Torchwood

Captain Jack and the SelkieBookmark and Share

Wednesday, 18 February 2009 - Reported by Chuck Foster
Maintaining the comic theme, Titan Publishing have provided details on the John and Carole Barrowman-penned comic strip Captain Jack and the Selkie, which appears in Issue 14 of Torchwood Magazine (due out at the shops in the UK on 19th February and the US on 17th March).

Carole E. Barrowman explains how the project took off: "When John and I were working on [John's autobiography] Anything Goes, we spent a lot of time together on the Torchwood set. In between our storytelling and moments of inspired silliness (maybe one or two), we decided we’d like to work on a project together that involved Captain Jack. The role of myth in a culture’s zeitgeist has always intrigued John and I (it probably intrigues all sci-fi fans) so I when I got back to the US, I sent John a short story I’d written, 'The Tale of the Selkie.' Almost immediately he called and said, 'This should be our first Captain Jack tale.'”

John Barrowman picks up the story: "Fast forward to ComicCon 2008 in San Diego, where we met the artists Tommy Lee Edwards and Trevor Goring. Tommy and Trevor had drawn a brilliant poster of my face super-imposed over the Face of Boe, which I think is the best piece of Captain Jack art I've seen. The four of us hit it off immediately and I asked if they’d ever be interested in working with us on a Captain Jack project. They thought about it for, oh, about 30 seconds, and so 'Captain Jack and the Selkie' was born!"

Media coverage of the comic strip: Metro, Press Association, Metro, io9, and Fear Net.


Titan have also provided a mini-interview between the two writers, which is reproduced in the spoiler section below.
From screen to strip! John Barrowman reveals all about his new comic strip creation. Here, John Barrowman discusses the strip in a special interview conducted by his sister, Carole.

CB: Ready to chat about our Torchwood Magazine comic?
JB: Wait. Shouldn’t we have some sound effects if we’re making this read like a scene from '24'?

CB: Do you even know how to write sound effects? You're the worst speller.
JB: I blame the doctor for that because when I was a kid I'd stay up late on Sunday nights when the classic DOCTOR WHO was on WTTW in Chicago so I'd never study for my Monday morning spelling tests. Add the sound effects later.

CB: Do you remember when we first got the idea to collaborate on a Captain Jack story?
JB: The summer when we were working together on Anything Goes. We were on location for Torchwood in a warehouse in Cardiff. I was filming the "Meat" episode.

CB: Wasn’t that the same shoot where the pigeon pooped on Jack's shoulder? Now that was hilarious.
JB: That was good luck . . . the shoot was taking forever. Lots of green screen shots. I think I started making up ways that Jack could end the scene and we could all get home. Now that I think about it, we came up with some funny stuff . . . I still think we should do something someday with the idea of Jack and the–

CB: Shush!! . . . Can we tease shamelessly like that?
JB [laughing] I think we just did. Anyway, I remember the endings we made up got more ridiculous the longer we all sat in that cold damp warehouse . . . you and I kept playing on the way home in the car.

CB: I'd forgotten about that . . . do you remember what we called the game?
JB: "What Would Jack Do?" . . . but the actual comic didn’t really take shape until Comic Con last summer in San Diego when we met Tommy Lee Edwards and Trevor Goring.

CB: It was the 'Face of Boe' poster that did it.
JB: The poster they created of Jack superimposed on the 'Face of Boe' still amazes me when I look at it. I framed it as soon as I got back to London. It's on the wall in my office and I think it’s the best illustrated characterization of Jack that I’ve come across . . . until our comic is released that is.

CB: And you see a lot of images of Jack.
JB: Oh, yeah . . . so after Tommy, Trevor and I signed a batch of the posters, I asked them if they'd ever be interested in working with us on a graphic novel about Captain Jack.

CB: We had a graphic novel in our head because we had both recently read Neil Gaiman’s MARVEL 1602. You’d bought it to send home with me for Turner [my son], but we each ended up reading it first.
JB: Was that the one where the X-Men face the Spanish Inquisition?

CB: Uh, huh . . . they're in Elizabethan England. Very clever stuff.
JB: Trevor and Tommy thought a collaboration sounded like a great idea and on the way home from Comic Con I knew that if we didn’t pursue the idea of the four of us working together right away, we'd all get busy with our individual work and it would never happen.

CB: Torchwood Magazine didn’t necessarily have a comic in mind did they?
JB: I don’t think so . . . but given that we’d just hooked up with two of the best artists in the comic world, as far as I was concerned, it made sense to pitch a comic . . . and then later when you and I were brainstorming on a story, I remembered you’d written something before about the myth of the selkie, and I thought it'd be a perfect plot to adapt for what, in my head, I was already calling a "Captain Jack Tale."

CB: Except that my story had nothing to do with Torchwood or Captain Jack.
JB: Not then it didn’t but we worked that out between us . . . I'd always wanted to do something that put Jack in Scotland and your original story was set on an island off the Orkneys. Plus we’d already agreed to tell a story that showed a side of Jack and a part of his history that hadn’t been explored too much in other media . . . I wanted to give fans something original about Jack.

CB: What side of Jack do you think our comic foregrounds?
JB: I think we see Jack’s compassion . . . maybe his guilt. Plus his wicked skills with a harpoon!

CB: You've always been a comic fan, haven't you?
JB: Oh, yeah. Love Spiderman, Batman, and definitely Captain America. . . I think it has something to do with when we immigrated to the States in the late 70s and I was trying hard to be an American kid. Couldn’t get enough of comics and Captain America . . . but I also love Superman–all the Justice League heroes for that matter.

CB: Do you remember the first mint condition comic you ever bought me when you could afford one?
SOUNDS OF SILENCE
CB: You haven’t got a clue, have you?
JB: A TIN TIN comic . . . plus a bunch of first edition 'Noddy' books.

CB: Nice save . . . so what do you think of 'Captain Jack and The Selkie' now that you’ve seen the finished product?
JB: I'm astonished. It's brilliant work. The panels with the selkie are completely breathtaking . . . and Jack looks so damn good.

CB: When Tommy and Trevor sent the first colored panels, I just stared at them in stunned admiration.
JB: Tommy Lee, Trevor, John Workman on the lettering, Martin Eden at Torchwood Magazine, everyone worked really hard, but Tommy Lee especially, given the tight deadlines and budget constraints.

CB: Are you game for another one?
JB: !bOng! !bOng! !bOng!




FILTER: - Torchwood

Lindsay Duncan cast as companion - UPDATEDBookmark and Share

Wednesday, 18 February 2009 - Reported by Anthony Weight
The Daily Record newspaper is reporting that actress Lindsay Duncan has been cast as the Doctor's companion, named in the report as Adelaide, in the second of the forthcoming special episodes which will see out David Tennant's tenure as the Tenth Doctor.

Duncan is well known for her roles in high-profile television dramas such as GBH and Rome. She is also appearing as Margaret Thatcher in next week's much-publicised BBC Two drama Margaret, concerning the former Prime Minister's final days in power.

The paper quotes Duncan as saying: "I'm thrilled to be involved in Doctor Who. I've never done anything like this before and I'm really looking forward to working with David Tennant and the Doctor Who team."

The special's co-writer and executive producer Russell T Davies is also quoted, saying: "Lindsay is an incredibly talented actress and I've been an admirer of her work for some time. We are delighted to announce that she will be joining the team and playing the Doctor's most strong-minded companion yet."

Incidentally, in 2008 Duncan co-starred alongside forthcoming Doctor Matt Smith in a critically acclaimed theatrical production of That Face.

UPDATE - Feb 19: The BBC today confirmed Duncan's casting as Adelaide. Production on the second special - co-written by Davies and Phil Ford - is due to start this spring.




FILTER: - Specials - Production - Series 4/30 Specials

James BreeBookmark and Share

Wednesday, 18 February 2009 - Reported by DWNP Archive
Posted By John Bowman

The character actor James Bree - who had three notable roles inDoctor Who - has died at the age of 85 after a long illness, reportsThe Stage.

Bree's first appearance in Doctor Who was as The Security Chief in the 1969 ten-parter The War Games - soon to be released on DVD. He appeared again in the show in 1980, playing Decider Nefred in the four-part story Full Circle, which was recently released on DVD in the UK as part of The E-Space Trilogy.

His final appearance in the show was as the Keeper of the Matrix inThe Trial of a Time Lord: The Ultimate Foe in 1986 (also available on DVD).

Bree's many other TV credits included The Jewel In The Crown, I, Claudius, Glittering Prizes, The Duchess of Duke Street, Z Cars, Rumpole of the Bailey, The Professionals, and Budgie. His film appearances included On Her Majesty’s Secret Service.

Bree died on December 1, 2008 according to the report, but his death has only just been announced.

(With thanks to Jim Sangster)




FILTER: - People - Obituary

End of the line for Dubai busBookmark and Share

Wednesday, 18 February 2009 - Reported by Josiah Rowe
Overseas filming for the Easter special episode Planet of the Dead has concluded, and Dubai-based newspaper 7DAYS has a (presumably) final report on the fate of the double-decker bus used in filming. The report contains minor spoilers for the special.

According to 7DAYS, the bus (which was damaged in transit to the UAE) was able to be used in filming, but is no longer serviceable and will be crushed into a cube. Members of a Doctor Who fan club at Dubai's English College were able to see the bus prior to its demolition.

The report also mentions that on their last night in Dubai, David Tennant and crew members watched the Wales v. England rugby match in a resort hotel's bar.

A photograph of the bus's interior and a larger version of the photograph at right can be seen in the newspaper's E-paper edition (free registration required).

(Thanks to "sunjunky" of the Doctor Who Forum.)




FILTER: - Specials - Production - Series 4/30 Specials