Sunday, April 12, 2009
Next up: The waters of mars
I09 seems to think that since "The Waters Of Mars" just happens to be an anagram of "War Of The Masters," that the Master must be involved somehow. I think they will save him for the finale personally.
Who is Donna marrying this time??????
Elisabeth Sladen and Tommy Knight recorded scenes yesterday for the forthcoming Christmas and New Year's Doctor Who specials - which conclude with the Tenth Doctor regenerating into Matt Smith's Eleventh. David Tennant was present, and had a brief scene with Knight (last time their characters interacted was via computer screen - the actors never met).
John Simm's Master was also thought to be present.
Master filming spy Scooty has a collection of images from filming.
Russell T Davies is interviewed in today's Telegraph, and states that "It's not quite as easy to guess what's happening as you think - there's nightmare sequences, and layers of fantasy, because the Doctor's coming to the end of his time. It's quite interesting to watch things being filmed, and think: 'Oh, I can see what that would look like...'" So, is this scene everything it first appears?
John Simm's Master was also thought to be present.
Master filming spy Scooty has a collection of images from filming.
Russell T Davies is interviewed in today's Telegraph, and states that "It's not quite as easy to guess what's happening as you think - there's nightmare sequences, and layers of fantasy, because the Doctor's coming to the end of his time. It's quite interesting to watch things being filmed, and think: 'Oh, I can see what that would look like...'" So, is this scene everything it first appears?
11th Apr 2009 Monster Metamorphosis
New Game Coming Soon!
Responding to a distress signal, the TARDIS lands in what appears to be a disused bio-data storage facility. However, the Doctor quickly realises that the signal was a trap - leaving him the one in distress! The Sontarans intend to punish him for crimes against their glorious Empire.
The Doctor formulates a plan and creates, via biochemical manipulation, a simple life form he calls 'Bob the Blob' which becomes his only chance of freedom.
Monster Metamorphosis is a new Doctor Who platform game which involves players working their way through several challenging levels and utilising the skills of the Slitheen, Cybermen, metallic Spiders and Ood in order to free the TARDIS and escape the Sontaran's prison.
It incorporates amazing 3D graphics with numerous challenging puzzles and obstacles which need to be overcome while also trying to avoid the Sontaran guards and their defence systems.
The Game will be launched on 21 Apr, 2009
Responding to a distress signal, the TARDIS lands in what appears to be a disused bio-data storage facility. However, the Doctor quickly realises that the signal was a trap - leaving him the one in distress! The Sontarans intend to punish him for crimes against their glorious Empire.
The Doctor formulates a plan and creates, via biochemical manipulation, a simple life form he calls 'Bob the Blob' which becomes his only chance of freedom.
Monster Metamorphosis is a new Doctor Who platform game which involves players working their way through several challenging levels and utilising the skills of the Slitheen, Cybermen, metallic Spiders and Ood in order to free the TARDIS and escape the Sontaran's prison.
It incorporates amazing 3D graphics with numerous challenging puzzles and obstacles which need to be overcome while also trying to avoid the Sontaran guards and their defence systems.
The Game will be launched on 21 Apr, 2009
Friday, April 10, 2009
June Whitfield to appear in final Tennant episode
CARRY On legend June Whitfield will appear in David Tennant’s last Doctor Who episode.
The Ab Fab mum, 83, is filming in Cardiff as Henrietta Goodheart for the episode Beautiful Chaos.
She was with her long-term pal Bernard Cribbins, who plays the grandad of Donna Noble (Catherine Tate).
Tennant admitted he wept as he read the last script, which reveals how the Time Lord is killed off.
He regenerates in the form of new Doctor Matt Smith.
Michelle Ryan talks timelords
Michelle Ryan was, at least for a moment, womankind's answer to Jason Bourne. She had a fearsome gym-honed body, bafflingly fast hands and feet, a satisfyingly glum backstory and admiring fans in the key US 18-35 demographic. Men wanted her, women wanted to be her. And, no doubt, vice versa - even if she was, technically speaking, part cyborg.
But Ryan was better than Bourne. Her face was chiselled rather than rubbery. Plus she had bionic vision, could leap tall buildings in a single bound, and when she kicked the bad guys in the crown jewels, they didn't reply: "That all you got?" They didn't, in general, reply at all.
Ryan was, until those damned writers went on strike in Hollywood last year and thereby nixed the 24-year-old's manifest destiny, the Bionic Woman. Even though she comes from Enfield and even though she spent five years on EastEnders as Zoe Slater, first as Cat Slater's sister and then - such is the way of things in soap reality - her daughter. She mutated from East End darling into stateside icon, becoming Jaime Sommers, a woman who made Buffy look like a wimp and Dana Scully seem a bit thick.
We're sitting over drinks in a members' club upstairs from the Ivy in London. A surprisingly tanned and slender Stephen Fry is a few tables away. As an interviewee, Ryan is as cheerful and sunny as can be. But she wasn't always like that. Is it true, I ask her, that in 2002 she was found on north London's so-called suicide bridge after a nervous breakdown?
"That story has been blown way out of proportion," Ryan says. "Pretty much all the stories are when it comes to EastEnders actors. I was 18 and, like anybody who's 18, I was going through one of those phases. I was part of huge overwhelming storylines [not only did her character's sister turn out to be her mother, she was also embroiled in a rape/abortion/murder love triangle with her boyfriend Dennis Watts and his dad, "Dirty" Den Watts]. "I was a young woman, barely that. I didn't know who I was or where I was going. Now I do. I've got a strong circle of girlfriends and a lot more life experience."
Ryan, if not a bionic woman, has rebuilt herself. Her latest assignment is a guest appearance this weekend in the Doctor Who Easter special. Its writer, Russell T Davies, hailed her for playing what the press people called "a mysterious jewel thief" called Lady Christina de Souza, who, after a heist, hooks up with the Time Lord on a double-decker bus in the desert where they must battle aliens. Like you do.
She is in awe of David Tennant, as was the last Doctor Who actor I interviewed, Dervla Kirwan (who did the Christmas special turn as a Victorian baddie). But didn't Ryan once audition to replace Billie Piper as the doctor's assistant (a role that went to Freema Agyeman)? "Not true," she says. "There are so many stories about me that aren't true."
The viewing figures, however, do not lie: Ryan had 14 million stateside viewers for the remake of Bionic Woman - the highest for an NBC TV series since the launch of The West Wing. "We really established a fan base and I did think she could be a female Bourne. I love those films and that's the kind of dark, fast, stylish mood we were going for."
When the show premiered, critics drooled. One male reviewer wrote: "Unlike Lindsay Wagner [the 70s original], who had the build and tensility of a matchstick, Ryan has shoulders broad enough to choke a crocodile." You can almost sense the critic yearning to be that crocodile.
Ryan remembers her bionic era fondly. "I have very strong legs from dancing," she explains [she was a professional dancer before EastEnders]. "One day I was on set and I had to kick this stunt guy. I warned everybody that if I kicked him, I would probably put him through the set wall - but the stunt guy was like, 'Yeah, whatever.' So I kicked him and he went through the wall. I loved it!"
She also loved training in Krav Maga, which, as the ex-Mossad agents among you will recall, is the Israeli secret service art of self-defence. "I would have to stand in a darkened room with my arms folded across my shoulders, and a man would come at me with a gun. And then I would disarm him. Then he would come at me with a knife. And I would disarm him. The idea was that these moves would become routine when we started filming. I used to walk around Vancouver [where the series was filmed] late at night thinking I could take on anyone - which, thinking back, probably wasn't that sensible."
With all due respect, why would a relative nobody from this rain-soaked dime of a country get a look-in at such an iconic American role? "I think it's because I have a very American body and looks," Ryan says. "They wanted the girl next door, but a girl next door who looked as though she might be able to look after herself. I'm big-boned and healthy-looking, you see."
There is something in this. Even on EastEnders, in which she starred for five years until 2005, she was an anomaly among the Hogarthian array of other actors on the soap. "Over there they think EastEnders is this great big deal," she laughs, and then corrects herself. "Which of course it is." Ryan was voted, the cuttings tell me, number 70 in FHM Magazine's 100 sexiest women in 2002, and number four in 2005. Even so, surely it can't be true that she beat Jennifer Aniston to her bionic role?
"Well, we certainly never met. I'd been doing a low-budget horror movie in Wales with Faye Dunaway. I did a tape in Cardiff, sent it off, and the next thing I know I'm out there meeting all these execs from NBC - people like David Icke - and they all want me to be Barnet Woman."
Hold on. Eccentric lizard idoliser David Icke, the man who believes that earth is ruled, for the most part, by beings from the fourth dimension, is an NBC exec? It turns out my ears need bionic implants. Ryan means David Eick, the producer responsible for successfully retooling another 70s series, Battlestar Galactica, for a new audience. And only after the interview do I realise that she means Bionic Woman. Barnet Woman would have been a rubbish sci-fi TV series.
Nothing, Ryan admits, in all her years on Albert Square prepared her for the thesp singledom glamour of working across the Atlantic. I ask her if, as was reported, she actually went out with Owen Wilson. "It never happened. There's this thing out there where your people call their people to see if they'd like to go out on a date. That happened a lot." Can't you just call them yourself? "That's not how it's done."
And then, one series in, Ryan's bionic dream crashed and burned. Reports suggested the producers thought the show too expensive for the ratings it was generating to warrant a second series. "It was really upsetting because we had been making a great, popular show. I thought there would be a new series after the writers' strike ended - but NBC thought the momentum we had built up had gone. So they cancelled it."
Worse still, on her return home, the welcoming committee of the British press wrote her up as yet another of those EastEnder try-hards (Martine McCutcheon, Jack Ryder, Tamzin Outhwaite) who tried to break America but got broken by it. What could Ryan do next? Would she swallow her pride and go back to EastEnders, as others have done after their career options dwindled? "There's just no way I would allow that to happen." Instead, she decided, it was time to stop buffing her body and hone her comedy skills instead.
"You know," she says, lowering her voice confidentially, "I once played a Guardian journalist. It was on stage. And I managed to get the story without having to sleep with Rod Liddle [the Sunday Times columnist]. I played an undercover reporter masquerading as an Essex girl at a Spectator party who gets really drunk." None of this is in my journalistic repertoire.
Ryan is talking about her role in Who's the Daddy?, the play based on the David Blunkett paternity case in which she appeared in 2005. "That was a comedy, so I thought I could do more along those lines."
She quickly had the opportunity, starring in Mr Eleven, an ITV comedy drama based on a newspaper story which said that, statistically, women marry their 11th sexual partner. "My character's this ditzy Bridget Jones-like mathematician who's getting married to her 11th partner and then finds out he's not her 11th at all, so the bottom falls out of her world." Is her love life like that? "I've had one serious relationship and now I'm just dating, having fun. So no."
The interview is over - she's late for couch time with Paul O'Grady. Ryan disports herself poutingly for the photographer in her Alexander McQueen shirt, then fields one last question. Would she kick me through a wall like she was bionic? Ryan charmingly rejects the suggestion, and we go our different ways - she to entrance a TV audience and pursue a glittering career, me to get bionic implants for my ears.
• Doctor Who: Planet of the Dead is on BBC1 tomorrow at 6.45pm.
But Ryan was better than Bourne. Her face was chiselled rather than rubbery. Plus she had bionic vision, could leap tall buildings in a single bound, and when she kicked the bad guys in the crown jewels, they didn't reply: "That all you got?" They didn't, in general, reply at all.
Ryan was, until those damned writers went on strike in Hollywood last year and thereby nixed the 24-year-old's manifest destiny, the Bionic Woman. Even though she comes from Enfield and even though she spent five years on EastEnders as Zoe Slater, first as Cat Slater's sister and then - such is the way of things in soap reality - her daughter. She mutated from East End darling into stateside icon, becoming Jaime Sommers, a woman who made Buffy look like a wimp and Dana Scully seem a bit thick.
We're sitting over drinks in a members' club upstairs from the Ivy in London. A surprisingly tanned and slender Stephen Fry is a few tables away. As an interviewee, Ryan is as cheerful and sunny as can be. But she wasn't always like that. Is it true, I ask her, that in 2002 she was found on north London's so-called suicide bridge after a nervous breakdown?
"That story has been blown way out of proportion," Ryan says. "Pretty much all the stories are when it comes to EastEnders actors. I was 18 and, like anybody who's 18, I was going through one of those phases. I was part of huge overwhelming storylines [not only did her character's sister turn out to be her mother, she was also embroiled in a rape/abortion/murder love triangle with her boyfriend Dennis Watts and his dad, "Dirty" Den Watts]. "I was a young woman, barely that. I didn't know who I was or where I was going. Now I do. I've got a strong circle of girlfriends and a lot more life experience."
Ryan, if not a bionic woman, has rebuilt herself. Her latest assignment is a guest appearance this weekend in the Doctor Who Easter special. Its writer, Russell T Davies, hailed her for playing what the press people called "a mysterious jewel thief" called Lady Christina de Souza, who, after a heist, hooks up with the Time Lord on a double-decker bus in the desert where they must battle aliens. Like you do.
She is in awe of David Tennant, as was the last Doctor Who actor I interviewed, Dervla Kirwan (who did the Christmas special turn as a Victorian baddie). But didn't Ryan once audition to replace Billie Piper as the doctor's assistant (a role that went to Freema Agyeman)? "Not true," she says. "There are so many stories about me that aren't true."
The viewing figures, however, do not lie: Ryan had 14 million stateside viewers for the remake of Bionic Woman - the highest for an NBC TV series since the launch of The West Wing. "We really established a fan base and I did think she could be a female Bourne. I love those films and that's the kind of dark, fast, stylish mood we were going for."
When the show premiered, critics drooled. One male reviewer wrote: "Unlike Lindsay Wagner [the 70s original], who had the build and tensility of a matchstick, Ryan has shoulders broad enough to choke a crocodile." You can almost sense the critic yearning to be that crocodile.
Ryan remembers her bionic era fondly. "I have very strong legs from dancing," she explains [she was a professional dancer before EastEnders]. "One day I was on set and I had to kick this stunt guy. I warned everybody that if I kicked him, I would probably put him through the set wall - but the stunt guy was like, 'Yeah, whatever.' So I kicked him and he went through the wall. I loved it!"
She also loved training in Krav Maga, which, as the ex-Mossad agents among you will recall, is the Israeli secret service art of self-defence. "I would have to stand in a darkened room with my arms folded across my shoulders, and a man would come at me with a gun. And then I would disarm him. Then he would come at me with a knife. And I would disarm him. The idea was that these moves would become routine when we started filming. I used to walk around Vancouver [where the series was filmed] late at night thinking I could take on anyone - which, thinking back, probably wasn't that sensible."
With all due respect, why would a relative nobody from this rain-soaked dime of a country get a look-in at such an iconic American role? "I think it's because I have a very American body and looks," Ryan says. "They wanted the girl next door, but a girl next door who looked as though she might be able to look after herself. I'm big-boned and healthy-looking, you see."
There is something in this. Even on EastEnders, in which she starred for five years until 2005, she was an anomaly among the Hogarthian array of other actors on the soap. "Over there they think EastEnders is this great big deal," she laughs, and then corrects herself. "Which of course it is." Ryan was voted, the cuttings tell me, number 70 in FHM Magazine's 100 sexiest women in 2002, and number four in 2005. Even so, surely it can't be true that she beat Jennifer Aniston to her bionic role?
"Well, we certainly never met. I'd been doing a low-budget horror movie in Wales with Faye Dunaway. I did a tape in Cardiff, sent it off, and the next thing I know I'm out there meeting all these execs from NBC - people like David Icke - and they all want me to be Barnet Woman."
Hold on. Eccentric lizard idoliser David Icke, the man who believes that earth is ruled, for the most part, by beings from the fourth dimension, is an NBC exec? It turns out my ears need bionic implants. Ryan means David Eick, the producer responsible for successfully retooling another 70s series, Battlestar Galactica, for a new audience. And only after the interview do I realise that she means Bionic Woman. Barnet Woman would have been a rubbish sci-fi TV series.
Nothing, Ryan admits, in all her years on Albert Square prepared her for the thesp singledom glamour of working across the Atlantic. I ask her if, as was reported, she actually went out with Owen Wilson. "It never happened. There's this thing out there where your people call their people to see if they'd like to go out on a date. That happened a lot." Can't you just call them yourself? "That's not how it's done."
And then, one series in, Ryan's bionic dream crashed and burned. Reports suggested the producers thought the show too expensive for the ratings it was generating to warrant a second series. "It was really upsetting because we had been making a great, popular show. I thought there would be a new series after the writers' strike ended - but NBC thought the momentum we had built up had gone. So they cancelled it."
Worse still, on her return home, the welcoming committee of the British press wrote her up as yet another of those EastEnder try-hards (Martine McCutcheon, Jack Ryder, Tamzin Outhwaite) who tried to break America but got broken by it. What could Ryan do next? Would she swallow her pride and go back to EastEnders, as others have done after their career options dwindled? "There's just no way I would allow that to happen." Instead, she decided, it was time to stop buffing her body and hone her comedy skills instead.
"You know," she says, lowering her voice confidentially, "I once played a Guardian journalist. It was on stage. And I managed to get the story without having to sleep with Rod Liddle [the Sunday Times columnist]. I played an undercover reporter masquerading as an Essex girl at a Spectator party who gets really drunk." None of this is in my journalistic repertoire.
Ryan is talking about her role in Who's the Daddy?, the play based on the David Blunkett paternity case in which she appeared in 2005. "That was a comedy, so I thought I could do more along those lines."
She quickly had the opportunity, starring in Mr Eleven, an ITV comedy drama based on a newspaper story which said that, statistically, women marry their 11th sexual partner. "My character's this ditzy Bridget Jones-like mathematician who's getting married to her 11th partner and then finds out he's not her 11th at all, so the bottom falls out of her world." Is her love life like that? "I've had one serious relationship and now I'm just dating, having fun. So no."
The interview is over - she's late for couch time with Paul O'Grady. Ryan disports herself poutingly for the photographer in her Alexander McQueen shirt, then fields one last question. Would she kick me through a wall like she was bionic? Ryan charmingly rejects the suggestion, and we go our different ways - she to entrance a TV audience and pursue a glittering career, me to get bionic implants for my ears.
• Doctor Who: Planet of the Dead is on BBC1 tomorrow at 6.45pm.
Wednesday, April 08, 2009
Doctor Who is back in town
THERE was a familiar if unexpected face among the cast and crew filming a new Doctor Who episode in Cardiff yesterday.
Catherine Tate – whose character Donna Noble was written out of the last series – was with David Tennant and Bernard Cribbins in a quiet cul-de-sac in Cyncoed filming what is believed to be the Christmas special.
Tennant, 37, will face a do-or-die drama during the seasonal special and go through the process of regeneration – a change in physical form that sees the Doctor transform into his next incarnation, who will be played by 11th Doctor Matt Smith.
Yesterday’s drizzle failed to dampen the stars’ spirits, with 80-year-old Cribbins, who plays Donna’s grandad, seen sporting a pair of festive antlers after cameras started to roll.
An onlooker told the Echo: “I saw them filming inside a house when it was raining then outside again when it wasn’t. David, Bernard and Catherine were all there and seemed to be in good spirits.
“I caught a glimpse of David and Bernard having a cup of tea and a laugh together as they filmed what looked like the Christmas special. The other day, David went out during the rain to sign autographs and pose for pictures with fans.”
Around a dozen fans gathered in Cyncoed to catch a glimpse of Tennant acting out his final scenes in the show. Half a dozen on-set security guards and police officers lined the road, and series fanatics said they could see the Tardis – the Time Lord’s famous time-travel machine – on standby at the set.
The Christmas episode is the one that fans have been anticipating most as the culmination of a series of four seasonal specials, the first of which will be screened on Saturday.
The Easter Special, Planet of the Dead, was filmed deep in a Dubai desert and fans will be able to see the episode on BBC One at 6.45pm.
Caleb Woodbridge, long-standing Doctor Who fan and author of series blog, A Journal of Impossible Things, said that even though the Christmas episode is more than eight months away, fans are already speculating about its plot.
“It’s a matter of great speculation and excitement. We know that David will be regenerated, but also that the show’s writer, Russell T Davies, likes his grand finales, so we expect it to be a very special episode,” the 23-year-old, of Roath, Cardiff, said.
“There are a lot of rumours floating around and fans think renegade Time Lord the Master could come back.”
It is still unclear how Davies will bid farewell to such a popular member of his cast, though he has promised the specials will involve CGI monsters, prosthetic monsters, army, police and an alien planet.
“It’s our last chance to have a bit of a laugh. Now the Doctor’s facing the end of his life, it’s going to get dark,” he said this week.
An estimated nine million viewers tuned in to watch the 2008 Easter instalment of the series.
Catherine Tate – whose character Donna Noble was written out of the last series – was with David Tennant and Bernard Cribbins in a quiet cul-de-sac in Cyncoed filming what is believed to be the Christmas special.
Tennant, 37, will face a do-or-die drama during the seasonal special and go through the process of regeneration – a change in physical form that sees the Doctor transform into his next incarnation, who will be played by 11th Doctor Matt Smith.
Yesterday’s drizzle failed to dampen the stars’ spirits, with 80-year-old Cribbins, who plays Donna’s grandad, seen sporting a pair of festive antlers after cameras started to roll.
An onlooker told the Echo: “I saw them filming inside a house when it was raining then outside again when it wasn’t. David, Bernard and Catherine were all there and seemed to be in good spirits.
“I caught a glimpse of David and Bernard having a cup of tea and a laugh together as they filmed what looked like the Christmas special. The other day, David went out during the rain to sign autographs and pose for pictures with fans.”
Around a dozen fans gathered in Cyncoed to catch a glimpse of Tennant acting out his final scenes in the show. Half a dozen on-set security guards and police officers lined the road, and series fanatics said they could see the Tardis – the Time Lord’s famous time-travel machine – on standby at the set.
The Christmas episode is the one that fans have been anticipating most as the culmination of a series of four seasonal specials, the first of which will be screened on Saturday.
The Easter Special, Planet of the Dead, was filmed deep in a Dubai desert and fans will be able to see the episode on BBC One at 6.45pm.
Caleb Woodbridge, long-standing Doctor Who fan and author of series blog, A Journal of Impossible Things, said that even though the Christmas episode is more than eight months away, fans are already speculating about its plot.
“It’s a matter of great speculation and excitement. We know that David will be regenerated, but also that the show’s writer, Russell T Davies, likes his grand finales, so we expect it to be a very special episode,” the 23-year-old, of Roath, Cardiff, said.
“There are a lot of rumours floating around and fans think renegade Time Lord the Master could come back.”
It is still unclear how Davies will bid farewell to such a popular member of his cast, though he has promised the specials will involve CGI monsters, prosthetic monsters, army, police and an alien planet.
“It’s our last chance to have a bit of a laugh. Now the Doctor’s facing the end of his life, it’s going to get dark,” he said this week.
An estimated nine million viewers tuned in to watch the 2008 Easter instalment of the series.
Tuesday, April 07, 2009
Tennant 'never wavered from Who path'
David Tennant has said that he "never once wavered" from the path to playing a Time Lord in Doctor Who.
The actor also told The Times that he understood the distinction between fiction and reality when he first watched the programme.
Tennant said: "I remember, after seeing Jon Pertwee turn into Tom Baker in Doctor Who, having a conversation with my parents at a very young age about actors and what they did.
"I remember getting the distinction between a character and an actor, as they explained it. I understood what fiction was very clearly."
He added: "I always feel uneasy when people talk about children not understanding the difference between fantasy and reality.
"I can only have been three, and was just enthralled. But I was quite clear that I didn't want to be a Time Lord - I wanted to be the person who played a Time Lord."
David Tennant will leave Doctor Who after this year's specials and be replaced by Matt Smith for the fifth series of the show.
The actor also told The Times that he understood the distinction between fiction and reality when he first watched the programme.
Tennant said: "I remember, after seeing Jon Pertwee turn into Tom Baker in Doctor Who, having a conversation with my parents at a very young age about actors and what they did.
"I remember getting the distinction between a character and an actor, as they explained it. I understood what fiction was very clearly."
He added: "I always feel uneasy when people talk about children not understanding the difference between fantasy and reality.
"I can only have been three, and was just enthralled. But I was quite clear that I didn't want to be a Time Lord - I wanted to be the person who played a Time Lord."
David Tennant will leave Doctor Who after this year's specials and be replaced by Matt Smith for the fifth series of the show.
Grandad will be a companion
David Tennant's final Doctor Who companion has been revealed, and it's a familiar face to fans of the Time Lord.
Doctor Who boss Russell T Davies has said that Bernard Cribbins - who played Donna Noble's grandad - will be back at Christmas as a companion.
Davies added that it will be a packed end to the year, with a special in November and a two-parter at Christmas.
So does that mean Donna will be back too? And if so will she still be unable to remember her adventures?
See pics of the Doctor Who Easter Special
And internet rumours suggest other characters could be back too for Christmas, as the actors who play them have been spotted on the film set.
We don't want to give anything away, but it seems like the Tardis could be packed tightly before Tennant hands over the keys to a new actor.
But while those episodes are a long way off yet, there is a brand new one being shown on Saturday.
It's called Planet of the Dead, and stars former EastEnder Michelle Ryan as a jewel thief who bumps into the Doctor and ends up travelling with him.
The Christmas specials are the last of four special episodes that will see Tennant give up the role as the Doctor.
Taking his place in the Tardis will be Matt Smith, who will become the 11th Doctor and star in his own series in 2010.
Doctor Who boss Russell T Davies has said that Bernard Cribbins - who played Donna Noble's grandad - will be back at Christmas as a companion.
Davies added that it will be a packed end to the year, with a special in November and a two-parter at Christmas.
So does that mean Donna will be back too? And if so will she still be unable to remember her adventures?
See pics of the Doctor Who Easter Special
And internet rumours suggest other characters could be back too for Christmas, as the actors who play them have been spotted on the film set.
We don't want to give anything away, but it seems like the Tardis could be packed tightly before Tennant hands over the keys to a new actor.
But while those episodes are a long way off yet, there is a brand new one being shown on Saturday.
It's called Planet of the Dead, and stars former EastEnder Michelle Ryan as a jewel thief who bumps into the Doctor and ends up travelling with him.
The Christmas specials are the last of four special episodes that will see Tennant give up the role as the Doctor.
Taking his place in the Tardis will be Matt Smith, who will become the 11th Doctor and star in his own series in 2010.
James Strong Interview at digital spy
James Strong reveals a little in this interview but not much we didn't already know.
Monday, April 06, 2009
Doctor Who boss Russell T Davies reveals talk of Star Trek crossover
RUSSELL T DAVIES has revealed that he had planned a crossover between the Doctor Who and Star Trek TV series.
Speaking to the Sunday Times, the Doctor Who showrunner said: "I would have loved to have done a Star Trek crossover. The very first year, we talked about it. Then Star Trek finally went off air.
"Landing the Tardis on board the Enterprise would have been magnificent. Can you imagine what their script department would have wanted, and what I would have wanted? It would have been the biggest battle."
Davies quits the hit show after this year's four specials, the first of which airs at Easter, and will be replaced by Steven Moffat. Star Trek makes a return to the big screen in May.
Speaking to the Sunday Times, the Doctor Who showrunner said: "I would have loved to have done a Star Trek crossover. The very first year, we talked about it. Then Star Trek finally went off air.
"Landing the Tardis on board the Enterprise would have been magnificent. Can you imagine what their script department would have wanted, and what I would have wanted? It would have been the biggest battle."
Davies quits the hit show after this year's four specials, the first of which airs at Easter, and will be replaced by Steven Moffat. Star Trek makes a return to the big screen in May.
Saturday, April 04, 2009
Will "Planet of the Dead" Be Finished In Time?
The first of this year's Doctor Who specials faces an adventure worthy of the Time Lord himself...
Ex-BBC Newsround presenter and uber fan Lizo Mzimba has reported, via Twitter, that the first of this year's Doctor Who specials is still not finished.
Tweeting on the social networking site the BBC presenter said: "No press launch. It won't be finished in time." The press launch for Planet of the Dead was due to take place this week but this is not the first time that a Doctor Who episode has gone straight from the editing room to the screen. Even last year's series finale was not shown to any press before its broadcast on BBC One.
Showrunner Russell T Davies has assured the fans that the episode will be finished in time whilst also adding that the title and a preview of the next special will be shown at the end of Planet of the Dead, airing Saturday 11th April, 6.45pm. It will be repeated the next day on BBC Three and then on Easter Monday on BBC One at 5pm.
As the first special approaches the promotion for Doctor Who hots up with David Tennant and Catherine Tate sitting in for Jonathan Ross on his Radio 2 show on April 11th. John Barrowman is their guest along with The Proclaimers. One-off companion Michelle Ryan can also be seen on Wednesday's edition of the BBC children's programme, Blue Peter.
Ex-BBC Newsround presenter and uber fan Lizo Mzimba has reported, via Twitter, that the first of this year's Doctor Who specials is still not finished.
Tweeting on the social networking site the BBC presenter said: "No press launch. It won't be finished in time." The press launch for Planet of the Dead was due to take place this week but this is not the first time that a Doctor Who episode has gone straight from the editing room to the screen. Even last year's series finale was not shown to any press before its broadcast on BBC One.
Showrunner Russell T Davies has assured the fans that the episode will be finished in time whilst also adding that the title and a preview of the next special will be shown at the end of Planet of the Dead, airing Saturday 11th April, 6.45pm. It will be repeated the next day on BBC Three and then on Easter Monday on BBC One at 5pm.
As the first special approaches the promotion for Doctor Who hots up with David Tennant and Catherine Tate sitting in for Jonathan Ross on his Radio 2 show on April 11th. John Barrowman is their guest along with The Proclaimers. One-off companion Michelle Ryan can also be seen on Wednesday's edition of the BBC children's programme, Blue Peter.
John Simm Returns to Who!!
As the days count down to Tennant's farewell, more faces return - some friendly, some not...
After Bernard Cribbins was spotted on set filming the last of the Doctor Who specials earlier this week, today saw the return of another familiar face, John Simm.
The actor, who played The Master in three episodes of Series 3 of the hit sci~fi show, was seen sporting a newly dyed blonde hairstyle on the grounds of Tredegar House. With Cribbins and Simm now in the bag, all eyes turn to next week when filming returns to Donna Noble's home and a possible appearance from Catherine Tate. She and David Tennant are presenting a BBC Radio 2 show on Saturday 11th from 10am until 1pm.
The last of the specials are due to be broadcast over the Christmas period with the finale, featuring Tennant's regeneration into Matt Smith, airing on New Year's Day. Russell T Davies recently revealed that the second of this year's specials will be broadcast before this period, shortening the gap for Who fans.
Planet of the Dead hits the small screen in the UK on Saturday 11th April on BBC One, 6.45pm with a simulcast on BBC HD.
After Bernard Cribbins was spotted on set filming the last of the Doctor Who specials earlier this week, today saw the return of another familiar face, John Simm.
The actor, who played The Master in three episodes of Series 3 of the hit sci~fi show, was seen sporting a newly dyed blonde hairstyle on the grounds of Tredegar House. With Cribbins and Simm now in the bag, all eyes turn to next week when filming returns to Donna Noble's home and a possible appearance from Catherine Tate. She and David Tennant are presenting a BBC Radio 2 show on Saturday 11th from 10am until 1pm.
The last of the specials are due to be broadcast over the Christmas period with the finale, featuring Tennant's regeneration into Matt Smith, airing on New Year's Day. Russell T Davies recently revealed that the second of this year's specials will be broadcast before this period, shortening the gap for Who fans.
Planet of the Dead hits the small screen in the UK on Saturday 11th April on BBC One, 6.45pm with a simulcast on BBC HD.
Thursday, April 02, 2009
Doctor Who – Planet Of The Dead airdate
Saturday 11 April
6.45-7.45pm BBC ONE
David Tennant and Michelle Ryan visit The Planet Of The Dead. When a London bus takes a detour to an alien world, the Doctor must join forces with the extraordinary Lady Christina, in this one-off seasonal special. But the mysterious planet holds terrifying secrets, hidden in the sand. And time is running out, as the deadly Swarm gets closer.
Planet Of The Dead features David Tennant as the Doctor, Michelle Ryan as Lady Christina and Lee Evans as Malcolm. It is written by Russell T Davies and Gareth Roberts.
Planet Of The Dead is also being simulcast on the BBC HD channel – the BBC's High Definition channel available through Freesat, Sky and Virgin Media.
6.45-7.45pm BBC ONE
David Tennant and Michelle Ryan visit The Planet Of The Dead. When a London bus takes a detour to an alien world, the Doctor must join forces with the extraordinary Lady Christina, in this one-off seasonal special. But the mysterious planet holds terrifying secrets, hidden in the sand. And time is running out, as the deadly Swarm gets closer.
Planet Of The Dead features David Tennant as the Doctor, Michelle Ryan as Lady Christina and Lee Evans as Malcolm. It is written by Russell T Davies and Gareth Roberts.
Planet Of The Dead is also being simulcast on the BBC HD channel – the BBC's High Definition channel available through Freesat, Sky and Virgin Media.
Wednesday, April 01, 2009
All the april fools for Dr who wrapped in one post lol
The Official BBC Doctor Who website now has a 20 second version of last Friday's new trailer, CLICK HERE to view it.
Due to the massive backlash from fans and Executive Producer Russell T Davies, the BBC have agreed to repeat the Series Four premier at 7:10pm Saturday, postponing "I'll Do Anything" to a later date, CLICK HERE for more details*.
It Ain't Cool News has an interview with Russell T Davies, who claims that when he was reviving Doctor Who the ghost of William Hartnell warned him quote: "You can't rewrite a Steven Moffat script! Not one line!" CLICK HERE for the article*.
*As you may have guessed it's April Fools' Day. Add Derek Jacobi and John Simm to the cast list of The Masters of Luxor.
Torchwood TV reports Elisabeth Sladen will be appearing in Torchwood's third season, CLICK HERE for that.
John Barrowman and Loose Women
BBC News is reporting that the 2009 Easter Special Planet of the Dead has been postponed, CLICK HERE for more details.
The BBC Press Office reports Georgia Moffett has been cast as the companion for Series Five reprising her role from The Doctor's Daughter as Jenny, CLICK HERE for more details from the Press Release.
The BBC Press Office also reports there will be a new mini series starring Derek Jacobi and John Simm called The Masters airing later this month on BBC One, CLICK HERE for more details from the Press Release.
The titles for the remaining 2009 specials have been announced. They are:
War of the Worlds (to air 31 August 2009 on the Summer Wheatley Bank Holiday)
Lost in Time (to air Christmas)
Degeneration (to air 28 December Boxing Helen Day Bank Holiday)
For more details CLICK HERE.
Also the titles of Series Five have been announced, except for episode 12. They are:
About Time (written by Steven Moffat)
The Dust of Stars (written by Neil Gaiman)
Time of the Zygons/Loch Ness Monsters (two parter written by Helen Raynor)
Scherzo (written by Rob Shearman)
Family Reunion (written by Stephen Greenhorn)
Fractured Time/Merlin (two parter written by Steven Moffat) Ice Time (written by Ben Aaronovitch)
The Fans of Death (written by Steven Moffat)
The End of Time (written by David Agnew)
Untitled/The Fool of April* (written by Steven Moffat)
For more details CLICK HERE.
BBC News has released a trailer for the 2009 specials, CLICK HERE to view (only available in Galactic Sector ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha).
Finally, another sequel to Douglas Addams' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy has been commissioned. It will follow Eoin Colfer's "And Another Thing…" and will be called "One More Thing I Forgot." The author will be Eric Idol, CLICK HERE for more details and HERE for the cover.
Due to the massive backlash from fans and Executive Producer Russell T Davies, the BBC have agreed to repeat the Series Four premier at 7:10pm Saturday, postponing "I'll Do Anything" to a later date, CLICK HERE for more details*.
It Ain't Cool News has an interview with Russell T Davies, who claims that when he was reviving Doctor Who the ghost of William Hartnell warned him quote: "You can't rewrite a Steven Moffat script! Not one line!" CLICK HERE for the article*.
*As you may have guessed it's April Fools' Day. Add Derek Jacobi and John Simm to the cast list of The Masters of Luxor.
Torchwood TV reports Elisabeth Sladen will be appearing in Torchwood's third season, CLICK HERE for that.
John Barrowman and Loose Women
BBC News is reporting that the 2009 Easter Special Planet of the Dead has been postponed, CLICK HERE for more details.
The BBC Press Office reports Georgia Moffett has been cast as the companion for Series Five reprising her role from The Doctor's Daughter as Jenny, CLICK HERE for more details from the Press Release.
The BBC Press Office also reports there will be a new mini series starring Derek Jacobi and John Simm called The Masters airing later this month on BBC One, CLICK HERE for more details from the Press Release.
The titles for the remaining 2009 specials have been announced. They are:
War of the Worlds (to air 31 August 2009 on the Summer Wheatley Bank Holiday)
Lost in Time (to air Christmas)
Degeneration (to air 28 December Boxing Helen Day Bank Holiday)
For more details CLICK HERE.
Also the titles of Series Five have been announced, except for episode 12. They are:
About Time (written by Steven Moffat)
The Dust of Stars (written by Neil Gaiman)
Time of the Zygons/Loch Ness Monsters (two parter written by Helen Raynor)
Scherzo (written by Rob Shearman)
Family Reunion (written by Stephen Greenhorn)
Fractured Time/Merlin (two parter written by Steven Moffat) Ice Time (written by Ben Aaronovitch)
The Fans of Death (written by Steven Moffat)
The End of Time (written by David Agnew)
Untitled/The Fool of April* (written by Steven Moffat)
For more details CLICK HERE.
BBC News has released a trailer for the 2009 specials, CLICK HERE to view (only available in Galactic Sector ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha).
Finally, another sequel to Douglas Addams' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy has been commissioned. It will follow Eoin Colfer's "And Another Thing…" and will be called "One More Thing I Forgot." The author will be Eric Idol, CLICK HERE for more details and HERE for the cover.
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