This Week In Doctor Who - December 3, 1999

Salt Lake City returns to Doctor Who this weekend!
THIS WEEK IN DOCTOR WHO - December 3, 1999

Most of online Doctor Who fandom has probably heard by now about Mark Phippen's troubles with his ISP Wednesday, which resulted in the sad death of all websites and e-mail addresses with Logopolis.com in them, including org...@logopolis.com , the recently launched This Week In Doctor Who e-mail address. Happily, it appears that Mark has been able to find a new, more trustworthy internet service, and somewhere between some or all of his web pages will be back online within the near future at new addresses. The Alliance Newsletter will probably have the new addresses of the site(s) that is/are already back, particularly The Doctor Who News Page, a popular resource originated in 1996 by Shannon Patrick Sullivan. For the time being, all e-mail regarding This Week should go to the old reliable bfel...@jnpcs.com . However, I have just received an offer to create a new "organon" address, which will hopefully be active in the very near future.

Before we begin the column, I would like to confirm to anyone who watched WQED Pittsburgh's Doctor Who special on November 27 that yes, that was my voice you heard briefly discussing the new Doctor Who audio releases. I had never done something like that before, but at least I didn't freeze. In the tradition of Doctor Who, the special was put together on a shoestring budget in a hurry, and it came out well. To paraphrase Mr. Lubinski: "Don't worry. If you flub a line, only 2 million people will hear it." If you missed the special, I think you're out of luck, because I believe it was supposed to be a one time only broadcast.

The final ratings for the opening evening (November 16) of BBC2's rerun season are in. Spearhead From Space eps 1+2 came in #19 among BBC2 shows.

#19 Spearhead From Space 6:01PM 2.89 Million

Not too bad for a BBC2 show, particularly a rerun. Hopefully the numbers will hold or improve.

To anyone looking for BCB Radio/Real Audio's The Who Review, they aired it last week to get it out of the way of Christmas programming. To avoid New Years' specials, the January edition won't air until Tuesday, January 18, 2000, at about 1PM GMT. BCB's website (and real audio feed) are at http://www.bcb.yorks.com/

KUED 7 Salt Lake City, Utah is adding Doctor Who to its schedule. It appears that the usual schedule will be 1 episode a week at about 11:15PM Mountain Time, with a rerun at 4:30AM. There is some confusion as whether an episode will air this week, or whether the first broadcast of the Doctor will be the marathon next Saturday beginning at 8PM. The marathon will include An Unearthly Child episode 1 and all the surviving regeneration "episodes" (not the whole stories).

PBS has a new search tool for looking up your local stations' schedule for this month (and sometimes next month). You click "Station Finder" from PBS' home page http://www.pbs.org/ , and enter your zip code or select a state. It's not complete yet (example - WYBE Philadelphia is missing), but it could be useful in discovering new Doctor Who stations sooner, or even for people who just like to look around and find out what different stations are airing.

Thanks to a marathon working session on Saturday the 27th, Ken Patterson was able to restore KTEH's versions of State of Decay, Warriors' Gate, and The Keeper of Traken to their original running lengths, using the methods described in previous columns to restore The Horns of Nimon, Meglos, and Full Circle. State of Decay aired on the 28th, Warriors' will air on the 5th, and Keeper will air on the 12th. The episodic Logopolis, which is complete already, will air on the 19th. These will probably be the last stories to be tweaked by KTEH for San Jose viewers for a while. On December 26th, KTEH will detour from its Who rotation for a bit over a month. They want to re-air some special editions of stories that they are about to lose the repeat rights for. They have paid for 3 showings apiece for these stories and have only aired them once, but the deal expires at the end of February.

MPT Maryland, be more careful. Last week you started The Deadly Assassin noticeably ahead of schedule, and almost anyone trying to tape the story wound up missing a large chunk of it. (With a 12:30AM start time (Midnight beginning Dec. 18), odds are that a large percentage of the audience can only see Doctor Who by setting their VCRs. If you are going to wise up and air the stories earlier in the evening, tell the viewers in advance.

Tentative KTEH San Jose, CA Who specials December/January:
December 26 - The War Machines - BBC Restored version
January 2 - Doctor Who And The Silurians - color-restored
January 9 - Terror of the Autons - color-restored
January 16 - The 5 Doctors Special Edition
January 23 - The Curse of Fenric Extended
January 30 - The War Machines - absolutely last chance to see this story in the Bay Area for some time unless you're going to buy the video

The following stations are not airing Doctor Who this week:
UKTV in Australia - off air until late January or February
NHPTV New Hampshire - returns December 19
KTCA St. Paul, MN - returns December 18
PPTV North Dakota - returns December 17 - only episode airing this month
{c{155=KBDI Denver, CO}} - off schedule for all of December, which is mildly worrying
KNME Albuquerque, NM - returns December 11

Updates and corrections are welcome at bfel...@jnpcs.com , the old address. And now, the listings:

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UK/Ireland:

BBC2 http://www.bbc.co.uk/
Tue 6PM GMT Doctor Who And The Silurians ep 1 of 7
Colour-restored broadcast. The Doctor and Liz join the Brigadier and UNIT at an experimental nuclear power plant which is having trouble from power fluctuations. It seems to be related to the caves the plant was built in.

UK Gold http://www.sceneone.co.uk/s1/tv/listings
Late Fri 1:05-2:55AM GMT The Mind Robber movie
A lava flow interferes with the TARDIS. To save the ship, the Doctor sends it sideways through time, into a realm of utter insanity. Unusually heavy on special effects and camera tricks for a 60s Doctor Who story.
Sun 9:25-11:20AM GMT Time-Flight movie
Adric's death haunts the crew as they blunder their way into the investigation of Concordes that have gone back through time. Guest starring Matthew Waterhouse as Adric (deceased).

UK Gold Classics http://www.sceneone.co.uk/s1/tv/listings
Sun 6-7:55PM GMT Time-Flight movie
Prime time rerun of the Sunday morning story.

TG4/TnaG http://www.tnag.ie/ http://www.sceneone.co.uk/s1/tv/listings
Fri ~6:31PM GMT Inferno eps 1+2 of 7
Next ~Fri 6:31PM GMT Inferno eps 3+4 of 7
Doctor Who remakes Frank Capra. George Bailey (the Doctor) wants to be rid of his obligations to Bedford Falls (the Earth) and hopes to use suicide (the power from the drill head) to leave this world (fix the TARDIS). If he's gone, who will stop Mr. Potter (Professor Stahlman) from his evil plans (rank stupidity)?

Europe/Africa:

BBC Prime http://www.bbcprime.com/
Late Fri 1AM CET (Not Africa) City of Death ep 3 of 4
Sat 5PM, Sun 11:30AM, Mon 11:35AM CET/CAT City of Death ep 4 of 4
The highest rated Doctor Who story ever sees the Doctor and Romana in 20th Century France battling a green alien pretending to be Julian Glover.

CANADA/USA:

SPACE: The Imagination Station http://www.hwcn.org/~an933/spacedw.htm
http://www.spacecast.com/
Sat-Thu 7:30AM The Dalek Invasion of Earth eps 1 - 6 of 6 (World's End, The Daleks, Day Of Reckoning, The End Of Tomorrow, The Waking Ally, Flashpoint)
The Doctor's latest attempt to return Ian and Barbara to 1963 has placed them all in 22nd Century London - a desolate city that appears to have been trashed in a war. What kind of enemy could do this? An enemy that is shaped like a pepper pot, I suspect.

Fri 7:30AM The Rescue: The Powerful Enemy ep 1 of 2
Dejected after losing his (spoiler protected) as a result of the Dalek invasion of Earth, the Doctor tries to visit a peaceful planet that has treated him kindly in the past. Instead, he and the TARDIS crew run smack into a murderer.

BBC America http://www.bbcamerica.com/
Sat 7AM+5PM, Sun 8AM EST The Hand Of Fear movie, pt 2 of 2
Last new episodes for a while. The Doctor decides to return Eldrad to Kastria before she inadvertently does more damage to England. NO episodes next week due to multiple marathons. Terror of the Zygons begins December 18.

WQED/WQEX 13, 16 Pittsburgh, PA http://www.wqed.org/
Sat 11PM-2:30AM EST - Sci-Fi Marathon
A mix of surprise Red Dwarf and Doctor Who episodes, running late into the night. With pledge breaks. Next episode December 18.

» This was replaced by a Great Performances special.

WYBE 35 Philadelphia, PA http://www.wybe.org/
http://www.tvquest.com/ zip 19129
Sat 11PM EST Image of the Fendahl eps 3+4 of 4
It seems that the Time Lords were the last race to tangle with the skull. It seems that they were not as successful as they thought. So naturally the Doctor, Leela, and a couple of humans think they can save Earth by themselves.

MPT Maryland 22, 28, 31, 36, 62, 67 http://www.mpt.org/
Late Sat 12:30AM EST The Face of Evil movie
Pledge season. Will probably manage to start even later than already advertised. The Doctor lands on a planet where he is known as an Ultimate Evil (TM). Well, when you've traveled through time as much as he has, you're bound to make some fatal mistakes at some time or another.

WUSF 16 Tampa, FL http://www.wusftv.usf.edu/gateway.htm
Sat 11:40PM EST The Caves of Androzani ep 1 of 4
Pledge season. May start late.
The Doctor and Peri land on a planet in the middle of a war. It's always the middle of a war, isn't it? They never seem to make it to the beginning of any wars.

WCET 48 Cincinnati, OH http://www.wcet.org/
Late Sat Midnight EST The Green Death ep 6 of 6
Late Sat 12:30AM EST The Time Warrior ep 1 of 4
Doo Wapped to a late start time. The 3rd Doctor loses Jo Grant, but gains Sarah Jane Smith. Also, the opening/closing credits change. WCET now links to PBS' search engine with local stations' schedules, instead of providing the information themselves.

WYIN 56 Gary, IN (Chicago, IL) http://www.wyin.org/
Sat 10PM CST Doctor Who's Who's Who 1985 documentary
Jon Pertwee, Tom Baker, Peter Davison, John Nathan-Turner, Louise Jameson, Matthew Waterhouse, Mary Tamm, George Takei, Issac Asimov, brand-new Doctor Colin Baker, and others discuss the phenomenon that is Doctor Who, just as it is becoming mainstream in the US and facing a hiatus in the UK. 1 hour special. Pledge season, so may start or end late.

» a clarification on 7th Jan that this wasn't shown in the end as the tape hadn't arrived, so The Brain of Morbius was shown instead!

IPTV Iowa 11, 12, 21, 24, 27, 32, 32, 36 http://www.sffn.com/
http://www.iptv.org/
Fri 11:05PM CST Invasion of the Dinosaurs ep 6 of 6
Operation Golden Age reaches its fruition. Humanity is about to return to the age of the Dinosaurs.
Fri ~11:31PM CST Death to the Daleks all 4 eps
The Y2K bug strikes the TARDIS as it passes by a barren planet. Barren apart from the big city. And those savages. And some exhausted humans. And some crippled yet feisty Daleks. Other than that, completely barren. Oh, alright. There's an excitable root ... Pledge season. Expect late starting times.

KRWG 22 Las Cruces, NM (El Paso, TX) http://www.nmsu.edu/~krwgtv/
Sat 10PM MST The Stones of Blood movie
Time approximate after pledge drives. Romana visits Earth for the first time. Our sympathies for Earth.

*New Doctor Who Station*
KUED 7 Salt Lake City, UT http//www.kued.org/
Sat 11:15PM+4:30AM MST "" ep 1 of ?
*New Doctor Who Station*

The Doctor is in real trouble this time. Which story is he starring in? Which persona does he need? Will the episode even air, or has it been pulled from the schedule? Oh crumbs. All night marathon next week, whether this episode airs or not.

» No episode was shown in the end.

KSPS 7 Spokane, WA http://www.ksps.org/
Sat 10:30PM PST (11:30PM MST) The Two Doctors movie
The 2nd Doctor and Jamie are apparently murdered while on a mission for the Time Lords. When the 6th Doctor and Peri investigate, they uncover a conspiracy involving Sontarans, Androgums, and time travel. This broadcast runs about 2 hours and 15 minutes, not 2 hours and 5 minutes as every single PBS station that has ever run the movie version has erroneously claimed. KSPS has a direct link to PBS' new search engine for exploring local schedules.

KBTC/KCKA 28, 15 Tacoma/Centralia, WA http://www.kbtc.org/
http://www.tvquest.com/ zip 98405
Sat 7PM PST Carnival Of Monsters eps 1+2 of 4
Time approximate from pledge drives. No late night rerun this week. For his first flight since being given control of his TARDIS back, the Doctor decides to take Jo Grant to see Metebelis III. His first attempt appears to have placed them onboard a ship in the South Pacific. The link to TV Quest is back up for the moment, as they have taken down the links to their schedules, by accident from the looks of it.

KTEH 54 San Jose, CA http://www.kteh.org/
Sun 11:18PM PST Warriors' Gate all 4 eps (Restored!)
Late start due to pledge drives. The 4th Doctor, 2nd Romana, K9 II, and Adric I arrive at a gateway that could offer them a way out of E-Space. But first, they have some villains to keep from hurting each other. This version was made using both the US episodic and movie versions of the story, to restore the episodic versions to their complete form.

CENTRAL/SOUTH AMERICA:

HBO PLUS http://www.hbo-ole.com/plus.htm
Doctor Who the 1996 movie
Late Mon 2:15AM Argentina (11:15PM Mexico)
Uncut, no commercials, Spanish subtitles. Next to last chance to see the movie in this part of the world this year. Next week's airing is even later at night.

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That's it for this week. Until next week, take care.

Benjamin F. Elliott

Doctor Who is a BBC Trademark. Copyright 1999.