The Hand of Fear DVD
DVD / Video
May 19, 2006
The official BBC Doctor Who website has confirmed the UK DVD release of The Hand of Fear starring Tom Baker as the Doctor and Elisabeth Sladen - in her last episode as a regular on Doctor Who - as Sarah Jane Smith. The DVD is currently due out on 31 July 2006. The release will feature commentary by Baker, Sladen, Judith Paris (Eldrad), Bob Baker (writer) and Philip Hinchcliffe (producer); "Changing Times," a 50-minute documentary charting the special relationship between the Doctor and his companion Sarah Jane Smith; "Swap Shop," a very rare clip of Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen's appearance on the first ever edition of Noel Edmonds' Multi-Coloured Swap Shop, shown in October 1976; plus PDFs of the 1977 Doctor Who Annual and the Radio Times listings for The Hand of Fear, a photo gallery, continuity announcements, information text subtitles and easter egg.

Mark of the Rani DVD
DVD / Video
May 23, 2006
BBC Worldwide has confirmed the release of Mark of the Rani on DVD on September 4 in the UK. The story, from Season 22, stars Colin Baker and Nicola Bryant as the Doctor and Peri, with special guest stars Anthony Ainley as the Master and Kate O'Mara as the Rani. The single-disc release will contain commentaries by Baker, Bryant and O'Mara (the Doctor Who Restoration Team notes that director Sarah Hellings agreed to do the commentary but sadly couldn't make it due to scheduling reasons); "Lords and Luddites," an interview documentary featuring comments by Baker, Bryant, O'Mara, actor Gary Cady, script editor Eric Saward, writers Pip and Jane Baker and others; "Now and Then," a special look at the Blists Hill Victorian Museum where the episode was filmed; a historical segment from "Blue Peter" on the Ironbridge Gorge; a clip of Baker and Bryant on "Saturday Superstore"; plus deleted and extended scenes, a photo gallery, isolated music score as well as alternate music score for part one, and PDF copies of the 1985 Doctor Who Annual as well as clips from Radio Times.

Doctor Who - 2 November Classic Who DVDs, Plus The Invasion's Missing Episodes Get Re-Created!
Posted by David Lambert
7/02/2006


November 7th will see the release of Doctor Who - Story #087: The Hand of Fear and Doctor Who - Story #140: The Mark of the Rani. Each item should be a single-disc release going for $24.98 SRP. Here are some basics:

Doctor Who - Story #087: The Hand of Fear stars Tom Baker as the 4th Doctor. This is a 4-part storyline from 1976. A freak accident traps the Doctor's companion Sarah Jane under tons of rock. After a miraculous survival, she is found frantically clinging to a large stone hand, and the Doctor senses a sinister power at work. Is this the end of the ride for Sarah Jane? Look for extras to include a commentary track by cast and crew (including Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen), a vintage interview on Swap Shop with Baker and Sladen, a featurette about Sarah Jane called "Changing Time", a Photo Gallery, Production Text Commentary, and lots more!

Doctor Who - Story #140: The Mark of the Rani stars Colin Baker as the 6th Doctor. This is a 2-part story from 1985. The Master has somehow returned, and is trying to re-write Earth history once more. But the Doctor must also face The Rani, and evil Time Lady who is also up to no good during the period of Earth's industrial revolution! Look for commentary tracks (Colin Baker participates, among others), a "Lords and Luddites" featurette, Deleted & Extended Scenes, a Blue Peter excerpt featuring Doctor Who material, a Photo Gallery, a Production Text Commentary, DVD-ROM material, and an Isolated Music Score, and a short interview with the composer of the final music track that was used for this storyline. What's more, the first episode has an alternate music track available as well. It was created by John Lewis, who was better known popularly as the singer "M" from the hit song from the '80s, "Pop Muzik". Lewis passed away during the production of this episode and couldn't finish the score, so Jonathan Gibbs started all over. But the full score from episode one is available here to listen to for the first time ever!


As if the two November releases aren't enough, word has come out from the BBC a couple of weeks ago that Doctor Who - Story #046: The Invasion IS in the works for DVD. That's surprising because this 8-episode storyline is suffering from two of the episodes being missing! According to the BBC story linked just above, and confirmed by the press release from Cosgrove Hall (yes, the Danger Mouse folks!), the two missing episodes will be re-constructed via animation! Yes, Patrick Troughton as the 2nd Doctor will be animated in loving detail, as Cosgrove Hall uses the original shooting script to re-create the visuals, and syncs it to the original audio soundtrack. That soundtrack had been restored by Mark Ayres of the Restoration Team for use with a BBC Audiobooks release of the remaining recordings, and that's the only connection that the RT has with the animation project. They did, of course, do restoration work on the six original live-action episodes of The Invasion, and they are also doing their usual DVD extras for this release as well. But the animation is all in Cosgrove Hall's hands, and it wasn't originally meant for DVD release. James Goss at BBC Online had commissioned the animated episodes for what the RT's Steve Roberts calls "an online project that never happened". So they were re-purposed for this DVD release, which is planned for release in the UK first (naturally) and then for later in North America. Stay tuned and we'll have a release date for that, plus artwork, as soon as they become available!