Two episodes of Doctor Who, unseen for almost 60 years, have been recovered, and will soon be available for viewing.
Episodes are parts 1 and 3 of The Daleks’ Masterplan.
My First Doctor era trivia is a bit rusty. Was this the serial that included a clip of the Beatles performing onstage, the one where the Doctor breaks the fourth wall to with the audience a happy Christmas, or both?
The Beatles were in The Chase, which exists in full
This is, however, the story where The Doctor says Happy Christmas to the audience. Sadly, that particular episode has not been recovered. And probably never will be. It was recorded on videotape, never transferred to film, and the videotape was wiped.
The Dalek Master Plan is one of my favourite serials, and I’m unduly happy that these were recovered. The story includes the treacherous Mavic Chen (played by the excellent Kevin Stoney), Guardian of the Solar System, who is secretly in league with the Daleks. I watched at the time, and still remember some of the storyline.
Oops; spoiler alert there, probably.
For a deep dive into the development of the Dalek Masterplan, see this article from 6388
Terry Nation was a science fiction writer who had no clear idea of the difference between a solar system and a galaxy, so he often got these concepts mixed up. But his ideas were generally impeccable.
I’m also very glad that one of the actors, Peter Purves, was one of the first people to see the newly recovered episodes.
I mean, the Doctor has regenerated at LEAST eighteen times since then, so I guess we know how it turns out.
In the course of this serial, Peter Purves’ character, Steven, is irradiated by Taranium (a mineral from Uranus, snerk) and becomes immune to Dalek weapons.
This treatment later wore off, but it might be no coincidence that Purves is still around in 2026, so it must have done him some good.
I’m just glad that there’s some footage of Katarina, an acolyte priestess of ancient Troy and the most criminally wasted of the Doctor’s companions.
I have a book somewhere that states that the reason Katarina was killed off on her first trip with the Doctor was because the writers thought a pre-industrial companion wouldn’t work with all the technical surroundings of the show.
If that’s true, what a bunch of lazy shirkers those writers were. In that storyline, Katarina thought that she was on a journey through the afterlife with the Doctor, with all the magic that would entail. They could’ve just played that up, and it would’ve been great if done well. And anyway, pre-industrial companions work just fine. Just look at Jamie and Leela.
But on another hand, it was actually good for the show that a couple of official companions got killed, Katarina and Sara Kingdom. It set the standard that companions are not automatically safe from harm. Makes for a more intense show.