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Click the links to go directly to articles on:
Doctor Who: the 2005-Present Series Change and Decay: Doctor Who Season 18 Humour and Miscellany 50 Things About... Doctor Who: the 1963-1989 Series Overviews Magic Bullet Behind the Scenes
Newest
article: Genocide of the Daleks
Rose
by Alan
Stevens and Fiona Moore
The opening episode of the new series of Doctor
Who
proves to be very, very now.
The End of the World
by Fiona Moore and Alan Stevens
Visually lovely and intriguing themes-- and could it be a sign of
things to come?
The Unquiet Dead
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
A chillingly rendered black comedy-- but what are the Gelth's true
motivations?
Aliens of London/World War
Three by Fiona Moore and Alan
Stevens
Alien creations with augmented pig cerebellums are
innocent OK.
Dalek
by Alan
Stevens and Fiona Moore
An instant classic, and we never use that term lightly.
The Long Game
by
Fiona Moore and Alan Stevens
The revolution will be televised with extreme prejudice.
Father's Day
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Never trust a human not to try to change history.
The Empty Child/The Doctor
Dances by Fiona Moore and Alan
Stevens
Keep Mum-- she's not so dumb.
Boom Town
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
A pun in the title, a sting in the tale, and a quick lesson in Welsh.
Bad Wolf/The Parting of
the Ways by Fiona Moore and Alan
Stevens
The party to Endemol.
2005 Season Overview
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Jury out: intelligent resurrection of classic concepts, or radical new
series for a new millennium?
The Christmas Invasion
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
No turkey for Christmas this year...
The Oncoming Storm? 2006
Season Overview by Alan Stevens
and Fiona Moore
BAFTAs or brickbats? You be the judge!
Change
and Decay:
Season 18
A series analysing Tom Baker's
final season as Doctor Who.
The Leisure Hive
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
A torrid tale of love, life sciences and lizards in a leisure facility.
Meglos
by Fiona
Moore and Alan Stevens
The Doctor is beside himself-- but is this a bad thing, or, actually,
quite good?
Full Circle
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
The planet Alzarius: an ecological parable, and a nice place to pick up
unattached young men.
State of Decay
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
The stakes rise as behind-the-scenes tensions flare, and Doctor
Who gets Hammered.
Warriors' Gate
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
The Doctor has a death wish, Romana goes to Gormenghast and Stephen
Gallagher gets his own back against the unionised employees of Granada
Television.
The Keeper of Traken
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Doctor Who
raids the Shakespeareian tradition to
give us a new companion, an old enemy and a brilliant debut for Anthony
Ainley.
Logopolis
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
The final chapter of the saga, in which the themes of change and decay
resolve into ones of nostalgia and regression.
The Doctor's Kill List by Mike Kenwood
How many kills has The Man Who Never Would actually racked up
between 1963 and 2017? We have the damning facts, figures, and
statistics.
Rose No More by Alan Stevens
Has the Eleventh Doctor's "crack in time" retroactively changed the
events of Bad Wolf/Parting of the Ways? Indeed, in the current Doctor
Who universe, does Rose even exist? Find out!
Doctor Who Celebration: Twenty
Years of
Cheated Memories by
Alan Stevens
1983 saw the now-legendary 20th Anniversary of Doctor Who
event at Longleat House. One of us was there. Thirty years on, he's
prepared to tell all.
The Death of Doctor Who
by Alan Stevens
A lightheartedly morbid look at how all the various Time Lords shuffled
off this mortal coil, and what David Tennant has got to worry about.
The Doctor Who
Confidential Drinking Game
by Fiona Moore
Want tips on how to lighten up the post-Doctor Who
half-hour? Grab a glass and follow the instructions.
The Doctor Who
Confidential Drinking Game part II
by Fiona Moore
They didn't let up for the second season, and neither did we.
The Doctor Who
Confidential Drinking Game part III: Torchwood Declassified
by Fiona Moore
No one connected with the series escapes the Drinking Game treatment.
The Doctor Who
Confidential Drinking Game part IV: Totally Doctor Who
by Fiona Moore
We mean it: No one.
The Doctor Who
Confidential Drinking Game part V: Confidential Series 3
by Fiona Moore
We could just go on forever, honest.
40 Stupid Things about "The Twin Dilemma"
(and 10 Cool Ones) by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
"That awful creature. I've never been so frightened in my life." The temptation to add "And the slug was pretty scary too!" is irresistible.
28 Stupid Things about "The Three Doctors"
(and 22 Cool Ones) by Fiona Moore and Alan Stevens
A story which makes extensive use of Cromer-Key.
33 Cool Things about "The Mind Robber"
(and 17 Stupid Ones) by Fiona Moore and Alan Stevens
"This world that we've tumbled into is a world of fiction. Unicorns, minotaur, Gulliver's Travels, they're all alive here." "Then what are we doing here?" Well, Zoe, I've got some possibly disturbing news for you...
28 Cool Things about "The Mind of Evil"
(and 22 Stupid Ones) by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
In which the Master has a more successful time as an Earth exile than the Doctor, and we all learn many interesting facts about Chinese languages.
36 Cool Things about "The Web of Fear"
(and 14 Stupid Ones) by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
In which the Doctor joins the Underground movement, and the Great Intelligence bypasses Victoria.
32 Stupid Things about "Arc of Infinity"
(and 18 Cool Ones) by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
In which John Nathan-Turner goes to Amsterdam in order to avoid making
a story about Amsterdam, and Tegan's cousin stars in a porn film.
54 Stupid Things about "Battlefield"
(and 6 Cool Ones) by Fiona Moore and Alan Stevens
A story so spectacular that it cannot be contained within the numerical
limits of an ordinary 50 Things article.
42 Cool Things about "The Sun Makers"
(and 8
Stupid Ones) by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
A
future in which ordinary people are exploited by corporations entwined
with governments intent on extracting every last inch of revenue from
citizens and perverting the welfare system. Nah, it could never happen.
34 Cool Things about "The Keys of Marinus"
(and
16
Stupid Ones) by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
In
which the First Doctor reveals he's OK with oppressive fascist
dictatorships, so long as he's not the one being oppressed, that is.
32 Cool Things about "Time-Flight" (and
18
Stupid Ones) by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
"The story just about gets away with
Kalid, mainly because it's hard to figure out exactly what ethnicity
he's a caricature of."
34 1/2 Cool Things about "The Curse of
Peladon"
(and 15 1/2 Stupid Ones) by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
In which we explore the invention of quantum politics.
38 Stupid Things about "Mawdryn Undead"
(and 12 Cool Ones) by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
An unwatchable serial about an alien in disguise as a schoolboy at a
British school with an ex-companion of the Doctor's as a teacher. But
enough about Class.
25 Stupid Things about "The Next
Doctor"
(and 25 Cool Ones) (It's A Tie, Folks!)
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
A real chocolate-box of a story: it's pretty, it's Christmassy,
and too much of the contents will make
you sick.
30 Stupid Things about "The Visitation"
(and 20 Cool Ones)
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Containing many entertaining, but ultimately useless, facts about
seventeenth-century England.
30 Cool Things about "Castrovalva"
(and 20 Stupid Ones)
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
In which we learn what a Time Lord has in common with a duck. No,
really, we do.
27 Cool Things about "Survival"
(and 23 Stupid Ones)
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Read to the very end for Ten Things Russell T. Davies Ripped Off for
the 2005 Series.
31 Cool Things about "Ghost Light"
(and 19 Stupid Ones)
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
A story that doesn't know when to stop evolving.
47 Cool Things about "The
Greatest Show in
the Galaxy"
(and 3 Stupid Ones)
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
"Throughout this '50 Things...', we suggest you substitute the
words
'Eighties Who'
for 'Psychic
Circus', and see where the parallel leads you..."
32 Cool Things about "The
Happiness Patrol"
(and 18 Stupid Ones)
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
The story that sparked a dozen faux-outrage pieces about Doctor Who's
alleged leftwing bias.
25 Cool Things about
"Dragonfire"
(and 25 Stupid Ones) (it's a tie, folks!)
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Because "Weevilfire" just didn't work.
29 Cool Things about "Delta and the
Bannermen"
(and 21
Stupid Ones)
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
It's a Fabulous Fifty Things about the Fabulous Fifties!
27 Cool Things about "Time and the
Rani" (and 23
Stupid Ones)
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
The proof of the pumpkin is, indeed, in the squeezing.
25 Cool Things about "Terror of
the Autons"
(and 25 Stupid Ones) (it's a tie, folks!)
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Everything you want to know about the Auton Invasion, except why.
27 Cool Things about "Spearhead
from Space" (and 23 Stupid Ones)
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
On 16mm film, so you know it's special.
35 Stupid Things about
“The Reign of Terror” (And 15
Cool
Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
In which we actually do research, which is apparently more than the
writing team did.
48 Stupid Things about
“Daleks in Manhattan/Evolution of the Daleks” (And
2 Cool
Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Who knew such madness could come from a single innocent piece of
brickwork?
30 Cool Things about
“The Seeds of Doom” (And 20 Stupid Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Gardener's question time.
47 Stupid Things about
“An Adventure in Space and Time” (And 3
Cool Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Your handy guide to the historical inaccuracies in the BBC's 50th
anniversary docudrama.
27 Cool Things about
“The
Ambassadors of Death” (And 23 Stupid Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Is Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart building an army of clones? Why did
John Abineri trim his moustache to look like Hitler's? And most
importantly, why is every woman in the serial wearing white vinyl
boots?
32 Cool Things about
“The
Krotons” (And 18 Stupid Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
A story which was filmed mainly because it contains neither spanking
nor dominatrices.
47 Cool Things about
“Genesis of the
Daleks” (And 3 Stupid Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Finding out what's cool about it, by autopsy.
32 1/2 Stupid Things about
“Attack of
the
Cybermen” (And 17 1/2 Cool Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Now with even more Cyber Controller.
29 Stupid Things about
“Revenge of the
Cybermen” (And 21 Cool Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
“I like to laugh. You can’t take this business too
seriously, can you?” --David "Vorus" Collings.
60 Stupid Things about
"Frontier in Space/Planet of the Daleks" (and 40 Cool Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Another double-length "50 Things About...", now with added
socialist philosophers!
27 Cool Things about
"Silver Nemesis" (and 23 Stupid Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
The anniversary special we all love to hate turns out to be more Cool
than Stupid-- who knew?
56 Stupid Things about
"The Trial of a Time Lord" (and 44 Cool Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
A "50 Things About..." double-length special, with added BRIAN BLESSED!!!
45 Stupid Things about
"Rise of the Cybermen/The Age of Steel" (and 5 Cool Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Are we human point 2... or are we dancers?
32 Cool Things about
"Carnival of Monsters" (and 18 Stupid Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Nanti denari here...
26 Cool, So To Speak,
Things about
"The Ice Warriors" (and 24 Stupid Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Sss. Sss. Sss.
35 Cool Things about
"Pyramids of Mars" (and 15 Stupid Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Return of the Hand of Sutekh.
32 Cool Things about
"An Unearthly Child" (and 18 Stupid Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Who is smarter, two schoolteachers or an illiterate cavewoman?
31 Cool Things about
"City of Death" (and 19 Stupid Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Once more, with Parisians.
33 Stupid Things about
"Terror of the Zygons" (and 17 Cool Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Continuing the series.
26 Cool Things about
"The Ark" (and 24 Stupid Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
As before.
41 Stupid Things about
"The Moonbase" (and 9 Cool Ones)
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
But we're not telling you which is which.
Doctor
Who: the
1963-1989
Series Reviews
The Hidden Factor
by
Alan Stevens
A brain-twisting exploration of time travel and the bootstrap paradox in "The Evil of the Daleks".
World's End
by
Alan Stevens
A look at Terry Nation's first draft for "The Dalek Invasion of Earth", why it was changed, and what we lost in the process.
The Daleks' Master Plan: The Unfolding Text
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore with thanks to Donald Tosh
A companion piece to our earlier
aticle on "The
Daleks' Master Plan", written
for a Celestial Toyroom
special on
members' favourite Doctor Who
stories.
The Wheel in Space
by
Ann Worrall and Fiona Moore
It's got Zoe in it, which makes up for a lot.
The Hidden Factor
by
Alan Stevens
Exposing the bootstrap paradox that underlies a classic Dalek story.
Destiny of the Daleks
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Oh look-- Daleks!
The Daleks
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Yes, it's about war and violence-- but perhaps not the way that one
might think.
Robot
by Fiona
Moore
What's the point in being grown up if you can't be childish sometimes?
The Web Planet
by Fiona Moore and Alan Stevens
The secret to doing stories with giant maggots, pantomime ants and
Mexican-wrestler bumblebees is knowing when to stop.
The Green Death
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
There's two reasons everybody remembers this one, and one of them is
the giant maggots.
The Invasion
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
The only Troughton-era Cyberman story that we actually think is any
cop. And we're going to tell you why.
The Mutants
by
Fiona Moore
The Third Doctor is thrown into an allegory of Apartheid-era South
Africa, but is everything completely black and white?
Day of the Daleks
by
Alan Stevens with Fiona Moore
Find out how this early-70s serial influenced later Dalek stories-- and
why it drives a time machine through established Dalek history...
The Chase
by Alan
Stevens and Fiona Moore
Terry Nation's absolute intellectual masterpiece, the pinnacle of his
writing career. Or not.
The Power of the Daleks
by Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Patrick Troughton's first Doctor
Who story-- is it
a stunningly iconic classic, or an overrated runaround?
Earthshock
by
Alan Stevens and Fiona Moore
Is it a travesty of Davis and Pedler's original ideas... or the best
thing to happen to the Cybermen since Mondas broke out of orbit?
Were the Daleks really past their best in 1973? What was Galloway really up to? And, most importantly, why was Sarah Jane Smith grabbed and dry-humped by two Exxilon rebels?
An Analysis of Resurrection of the Daleks by Alan StevensThe Mad Mariachi's Master
Plan by Alan Stevens and Fiona
Moore
Why is the Doctor Who
story "The Enemy of the
World" like "The
Daleks' Master Plan"?
Why is it continually overlooked by fan commentators? And why, oh why,
did anybody think it was a good idea to have Patrick Troughton dress up
as a Mariachi band leader?
The Evil of the Doctor
by Alan Stevens
Previously published in In-Vision,
this is the
revised and
expanded version of the controversial "Remembrance of the Daleks"
review which was applauded by some, hated by others, and the subject of
an extended rant by Lawrence Miles. Is the Seventh Doctor godlike and
omniscient-- or amoral and genocidal?
The Faceless Ones
by Fiona Moore and Alan Stevens
A Troughton-era tale of mystery and kidnapping at an airport... hides a
behind-the-scenes story of duelling egos, deteriorating cast/crew
relations and the problem of sex in Doctor
Who.
Find out how!
The Tomb of the Cybermen
by Alan Stevens
A controversial look at a long-lost Doctor
Who
story. Hailed as a classic upon its rerelease in 1992, is it truly
worthy of the name-- or is it a poorly-written, racist pastiche with
less depth than an ant's swimming pool?
Genocide of the Daleks by
Alan Stevens
A detailed exploration of Doctor Who Magazine's classic comic strip "Emperor of the Daleks!", and how it helps us better understand the Daleks... and the Doctor!
Dalek Art by
Alan Stevens
Do the fascist mutants of the planet Skaro have an artistic side? Are they the ones behind the mysterious carvings on the planet Spiridon? And what is their strange connection with modern British sculptor Barbara Hepworth... and plagiarism-courting American artist Roy Lichtenstein?
Resurrection of Fear by
Fiona Moore
How is "Resurrection of the Daleks" like "The Web of Fear"? No, it's
not a riddle... it's one of the great overlooked connections of Sixties
and Eighties Doctor Who.
Doctor Clueless by
Ann Worrall
Is Thirteen the lucky number? An exploration of what's right and wrong
with Jodie Whittaker's first season.
Sometimes The Pattern Is More Obvious by
Fiona Moore
What can the anthropology of classification explain about fans'
obsession with continuity, and can it ever be cured?
You Mean All This Time We Could Have Been
Friends? by Fiona Moore
The casting of a woman as the Master was controversial... but did
anyone notice the actual revolutionary message the regendering sent?
Find out about the new kind of chaos Missy causes!
Jon The Second
by
James Cooray Smith
In his third essay for Celestial Toyroom, Jim considers which actor was
the official Doctor Who during the 17-year hiatus-- the answer will
surprise you!
Women of Paris, Men from
Atlantis by
James Cooray Smith
Jim takes on the controversial question of what really caused Doctor
Who's meteoric rise, and spectacular plunge, in the ratings in the late
1970s and early 1980s.
A Matter of Memory
by James Cooray Smith
Why is it the Doctor can sometimes remember the events of multi-Doctor
adventures, and sometimes not? One man dares to tackle this question--
and survives!
Davros in Context
by Alan Stevens
Should Davros have returned to
the series after the end of "Genesis of the Daleks"? Perhaps not...
The Man Who Invented the
Daleks: A Review and Personal Reflection
by Alan Stevens
A companion piece to the Interview
with Alwyn
Turner, reviewing and commenting
on the life and work of Terry Nation.
The Sound and the Fury: Is Doctor
Who Better Suited to Audio or
Video? by Fiona Moore
In these days when much Doctor
Who-related material
is only available on audio, we tackle the crucial question: is audio
just a poor substitute for video, or does it add something to the
programme which the videos fail to deliver?
Not as Primitive as
they Look: An Anthropologist on Doctor Who
by Fiona Moore
Magic Bullet's webmaster and co-production manager is persuaded to put
on her other hat and take a quirky mystery-tour around the primitive
tribes of Doctor Who.
Doctor Davros, or How I
Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Daleks
by Fiona Moore
An introspective and insightful essay, examining the Cold War origins
of the Daleks, and considering "Genesis of the Daleks" as an allegory
of something very sinister indeed.
Magic Bullet Behind the Scenes
By special arrangement with the Doctor Who Appreciation Society, we bring you four complete issues of their magazine Celestial Toyroom themed around "The Robots of Death" and Kaldor City, edited and written by Magic Bullet and friends. Right-click to download, or left-click to read in browser:
Celestial Toyroom 506 (portrait)
Celestial Toyroom 506 (landscape)
Celestial Toyroom 508/9 (portrait)
Celestial Toyroom 508/9 (landscape)
Celestial Toyroom 516 (portrait)
Celestial Toyroom 516 (landscape)
Celestial Toyroom 520/1 (portrait)
Celestial Toyroom 520/1 (landscape)
That One With The Killer Robots by
Gareth Kavenagh
In 2012, The Robots of Death
and Storm Mine caused a sensation
at the Manchester Fringe Festival... as stage plays! Find out how and
why in this retrospective from the producer himself.
Skulduggery: A Kaldor City story
by Fiona Moore and Alan Stevens
Set between Occam's Razor and Death's Head, this short story
features Carnell offering some innovative solutions to Firstmaster
Landerchild's problems...
Tournament of Shadows: The
Taren Capel
Chess Game by Alan Stevens
The events of Kaldor
City: Taren Capel
were dominated by a very peculiar chess game. Want to follow along?
Here are the moves in full...
Welcome
to Kaldor City, Population: 1 by
Dale Smith (offsite)
Doctor
Who books
writer Dale Smith offers a critical overview of the Kaldor City
series,
exploring what it is, and could be, about.
Interview with Alan Stevens by Chris
Duecker
(offsite)
An interview with Kaldor City
co-creator and Faction Paradox producer
Alan Stevens.
A Day in Kaldor City:
8 August 2002 by Douglas
McNaughton
Behind the scenes on the recording of
Kaldor City: Taren Capel and
Kaldor
City: Hidden Persuaders,
featuring details of the strange
links between David Cronenberg and Kaldor
City, the real story behind
Edward Woodward's nickname, and a mini-interview with series writer Jim
Smith!
Recording Kaldor
by Jim Smith
An account of the recording of Kaldor
City 3: Hidden Persuaders, by
one of the CD's authors.
