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Big Finish Christmas Podcast

It's nearly Xmas, and as an early present for executive producer Nick Briggs and line producer David Richardson,two microphones arrived on their office desks. 'Hey, we could do thepodcast right here!' said David in an unconvincing American accent. Andso, the two office chums set about recording a podcast summing up theyear 2008 for Big Finish... well,only almost all of 2008. Join the would-be (but NEVER will be) Smashy and Nicey of Big Finishas they give candid recollections of their work this year. You'll hearstories of the stars, the recordings, the sheer fun of it all. Thereare the Companion ChroniclesAwards! There's even a little bit of controversy and a tiny bit of dogpoo. But never mind the dog poo, here's a fun-packed run-down of allthe best Big Finish moments of 2008.

And a merry Christmas and a happy New Year to all our listeners!

Click here to download the Big Finish Christmas Podcast

New Eighth Doctor and Lucie Adventures Now Available for Pre-order

Earlier this month we told you about the exciting new weekly series of Eighth Doctor and Lucie adventures we have planned for 2009. Well, now you can get in early and pre-order them.

This third series stars Paul McGann as the Doctor with Sheridan Smith as his companion Lucie Miller. It boasts an amazing guest cast including Nigel Planer, Andrew Sachs, Miriam Margolyes, Colin Salmon, Samantha Bond, Stephen Moore, Phill Jupitus and dozens of other big names. The series also features the return of the Wirrn, the Krynoids and those eight-legged freaks from Metebelis 3.

We are offering the full series of eight two-part adventures (that's sixteen half-hour episodes) for pre-order now and if you buy them online you will automatically get them as downloads, too - at no extra cost! The downloads start on Saturday March 7th with Orbis: Part One, followed the next Saturday by Orbis: Part Two, then Hothouse: Part One the week after and so on. Each two-part story is priced at £10.99 but you can get all 8 adventures for just £60 if you subscribe to the whole season - that's a saving of nearly £30!

When you subscribe you will be given your own personal RSS feed that will notify you when your download is ready, so you wont have to remember our weekly release schedule for 2009 - it'll just happen automatically. Once you subscribe, simply go to the "My Account" section of the web site and you will find the RSS feed at the top.

As Lucie herself might say: sixteen brand new half-hour episodes of Doctor Who for just £60? Result!

8,000 Members And Counting...

The new Big Finish website has been going for ten months and in that time we've been growing in leaps and bounds. Thousands of you have now signed up as members of the Big Finish community, and today we hit a real milestone with our 8,000th member. Welcome aboard, rdocon!

As we go into the New Year, we shall continue to grow our Big Finish community with lots of new features exclusively for our members. We'll be offering more free downloadable adventures such as the U.N.I.T. story we gave away earlier this year, and we'll soon have a brand new chat room where you'll be able to speak directly to the actors via special moderated chats.

Thank you to everyone who has joined our community this year. We look forward to having you with us for a bigger and better 2009!

Big Finish Podcast Episode 10

At long last! In our tenth Big Finish Podcast, regular contributors Paul Wilson and Barnaby Edwards catch up on the latest Big Finish news, including Doctor Who: Forty-Five, the new series of Dark Shadows, the third Doctor Who stage play Curse of the Daleks, the most recent Companion Chronicles Home Truths and Transit of Venus, and an in-depth discussion of the new series of Eighth Doctor and Lucie adventures.

Plus there's an exclusive interview with Colin Baker and India Fisher taken during the recording of Doctor Who: The Doomwood Curse. Also in the show, we check out a listener's top 5 stories and answer some of your feedback.

Please send your feedback to feedback@bigfinish.com

Simon Guerrier tells some Home Truths

House Proud
How long does it take to write a Doctor Who audio? Simon Guerrier, author of the Companion Chronicle Home Truths, checks his diaries?

Tuesday 11 December 2007, about 09.00
I?m wending my way through Notting Hill on the 52 bus, off to a freelance job writing a sticker book, when I bump into Nigel Fairs. He?s off to Big Finish?s usual studios and we gossip about what we?re both up to. The Wake is finished so my duties on Benny are over. I?ve got to type up my notes on How The Doctor Changed My Life, but otherwise I?m not doing much. Ever tactful, Nigel says we should work on something again soon.

Wednesday 12 December, 15.36
An email from David Richardson. Nigel has suggested me for something they?re planning, ?a 5th Doctor mini-series that is a sequel to the Key to Time series, for release in 2009?. Can I come along to ?a preliminary writers? meeting for either the morning of Wednesday 19 or the afternoon of Wednesday 20,? at Jason Haigh-Ellery?s swanky club in London? No, I can?t ? I?m still writing a sticker book. ?You?re fired,? says David.

Thursday 13 December, 20:20
?How busy are you in the early months of 2008?? asks David Richardson. ?Besides the Key 2 Time... I'm gonna be producing the third series of Companion Chronicles, and wondered if you'd be interested in writing one...?.

Tuesday 18 December, after 18.30
The preliminary writers? meeting. We drink posh drinks in posh surroundings and discuss the bare bones of Key 2 Time. I meet David Richardson in the flesh for the first time and beg to be allowed to write for Sara Kingdom. I?ve got this wheeze for the framing sequence, of an older Sara recalling her adventures with the Doctor even though she died as a young woman. David says he?d like a historical story ? or at least something very different from the sci-fi adventures Sara enjoyed onscreen.

Wednesday 19 December, 13.55
I send round my first outline for what will one day be The Judgment of Isskar. Some things survive to the final version ? the fifth Doctor, the Key to Time, the last scene of part four. Everything else ? new companions called Mary and Angie, the return of an old friend of the Doctor?s, a fake London of 2009 ? gets binned over the next few weeks.

Wednesday 24 December, some time in the afternoon
I make my first notes on the Sara Kingdom story, in which the TARDIS visits a spooky family home at Christmas. The gist of the final story is there in the outline. I?m stealing the second character ? who I?ll later name after my friend Robert Dick ? from the Superman comic strip ?For Tomorrow?.

Sunday 30 December, 18.21
I send David a rough 500-word outline for ?The House of Pleasure?, ?a science-fiction twist on a haunted house story, perhaps with a Christmas flavour like the BBC?s old MR James adaptations.? David is pleased, wants it ?to drip with that black and white TV feeling? but worries the title sounds rude. I suggest ?Home Comforts? and ?House Proud? while he contacts Jean Marsh?s agent.

Thursday 3 January 2008, 12.17
?HOOOOOOOOOOORAY!? says David?s email. Jean Marsh has agreed to reprise Sara Kingdom. I resend my outline to David for passing to Big Finish script editor Alan Barnes. I explain that ?I've changed it from House of Pleasure to House of Judgment, which is also the name of a prose poem by Oscar Wilde. Which, of course, I knew beforehand.?

Friday 4 January, 18.42
?Cute,? says Alan, and points out that ?Stephen? should be spelled with a ?v?. Whoops. He also says: ?It's a spooky house at Christmas. The Chimes of Midnight is probably the single most highly regarded BF production. It's kind of cornered the market in spooky houses at Christmas. I think it'd be more interesting to make it a crazy space house, in an abandoned futuristic Ideal Home exhibition or something.?

Sunday 6 January, 11.50
I send Alan and David a 1,200-word outline for ?The House of Judgment?, this time detailing the progression of events in the story. Alan suggests we call it ?Dream Home?. He also feels that once Sara knows what?s happening it ends too quickly. ?My instinct would be to go for a realisation-ordeal-resolution sort of thing, where Sara realises what's going on but something gets in the way.?

Monday 7 January, 10.38
I send David a revised outline, now called ?Home Truths?. David reminds me it needs to be in two episodes, so I add a cliffhanger. We get back to discussing my Key 2 Time outline: whether I can use the Ice Warriors and whether new companions Eve and Janus should both travel with the Doctor in part one.

That script becomes the priority for the next few months. Then David wants me writing a completely different Companion Chronicle linking to the Key 2 Time. Zara (formerly Janus) will share a cell with Ace in The Prisoners? Dilemma.

17 April, 12.32
The synopsis for Home Truths has been approved by the estate of Terry Nation ? who created Sara Kingdom. The BBC approves it too, with a couple of minor changes.
A week later, we record all three Key 2 Time plays. In May, I?m busy writing ? and rewriting ? The Prisoners? Dilemma and then the first draft of Home Truths.

Monday 2 June, 10.24
I send David the first draft of Home Truths. I check Lisa Bowerman is directing the story because I?ve an idea for part two?

Thursday 5 June, 14.50
Jacqueline Rayner provides some additional comments on the script ? ?structurally it seems fine, they're mainly small niggles?. I make these changes that afternoon and also suggest that, as per Doctor Who of the time, the story should have individual episode titles. I suggest ?The Dream House? for part one followed by ?Home Truths?. David stares at me strangely.

Wednesday 11 June, 10.55
The BBC approves the script. David has to book it into studio and we need to cast someone to play Robert.

Monday 16 June, all day
Recording of The Prisoners? Dilemma. I go along, get in the way and talk to Lisa Bowerman about the feel of Home Truths. She listens with heroic patience.

Thursday 19 June, 10.25
I answer David?s questions about my two Companion Chronicles for a forthcoming feature in Doctor Who Magazine.

Tuesday 3 July, 11.54
I provide David with blurbs and liner notes for both Companion Chronicles. I mention that, with Home Truths, Sara has been in more Doctor Who episodes than Captain Jack Harkness. David cuts that bit.

Monday 7 July, 14.59
David tells me Home Truths will be recorded on 8 September, since Jean Marsh is in a play until then. I check my diary. Drat! I?ll be in Seville.

Friday 18 July, 18.33
I enthuse to David and Simon Holub about the cover for Home Truths, which has been put up on the Big Finish website. Simon sends me a large version of the artwork. Hooray!

Monday 8 September, 12.44 (local time)
I text David to see how the recording is going, while stood in front of the cathedral glimpsed in The Two Doctors. Then I have an ice cream.

Saturday 18 October, 15.43
Paul Wilson, who runs the Big Finish website, kindly provides me with a download of Home Truths, which has gone off to be pressed. I?m meant to be doing my tax return. Instead I am grinning and giggling. Cor, it?s so much better than I?d hoped. I send an email to David Darlington thanking him for the impressive sound design. Only it wasn?t him who did it.

Wednesday 12 November
The huddled masses are able to download Home Truths from the Big Finish website and the CDs are posted out.

The Three Companions

We can now reveal the cast of The Three Companions, the 12-part Companion Chronicles mini-series that will be included as a bonus feature on monthly Doctor Who plays commencing in Spring 2009. Anneke Wills (pictured here) returns as Polly who, in the present day, tracks down Jo Grant (Katy Manning), and realizes their past adventures with the Doctor have actually intersected. Meanwhile, as the planet Earth faces environmental catastrophe, a third companion is observing them from afar... A certain Thomas Brewster (John Pickard), who is in possession of a stolen TARDIS.

The Three Companions is written by Marc Platt, and directed by Lisa Bowerman.

Horrors Old and New For the Doctor, Ace and Hex

Following on from November?s Forty-Five, the Seventh Doctor, Ace and Hex return to the Doctor Who range in the spring of 2009, in a season of three new adventures.

April?s The Magic Mousetrap, by Year of the Pig author Matthew Sweet, sees the Doctor end up at a Swiss sanatorium in the year 1926, where director Ludovic ?Ludo? Comfort uses parlour games to keep his rich and famous patients busy. The Doctor soon suspects, however, that someone?s playing a more sinister game. Someone with a score to settle?

Skaro?s deadliest are back in May. Enemy of the Daleks, an all-action space adventure by Judge Dredd/Sarah Jane Smith writer David Bishop, has the TARDIS travellers fall in with starship troopers struggling to defend a remote research facility from an all-out Dalek attack. But this time, could it be the Daleks need saving??

Finally, in June, the TARDIS arrives at the scene of one of history?s greatest military disasters ? the Crimean War ? in an as-yet-untitled epic by Paul Sutton, author of adventures including Exotron and No More Lies. Separated from his friends in time and space, Hex has to deal with the horrors of life in a Crimean field hospital ? as an assistant to Florence Nightingale!

As ever, the Doctor is played by Sylvester McCoy, Ace by Sophie Aldred and Hex by Philip Olivier. The Magic Mousetrap and Enemy of the Daleks can be pre-ordered now

New Dark Shadows

We can now announce the imminent release of the next two dramatic readings in the Dark Shadows series.

For these two new releases, the focus is on the characters of Quentin and Angelique, played by Lara Parker and David Selby. Released this month, The Skin Walkers takes place in New York at the turn of the century, where Quentin is stalked by a mysterious cult, hell-bent on harnessing his werewolf powers. Meanwhile, The Path of Fate, to be released in December, explores Angelique and marks the Big Finish debut of Stephen Mark Rainey, an author familiar to Dark Shadows fans from his acclaimed official novel, Dark Shadows: Dreams of the Dark.

We are also gearing up to record the final two dramatic readings, which will feature a Dark Shadows original series actor new to Big Finish, who we?ll be announcing soon.

Series two of the full-cast audio dramas is on track for release in August 2009 and will be our most ambitious Dark Shadows project to date. It?s a four-part epic, continuing our ongoing stories in grand fashion. We will be recording these new CDs once the last of our current run of Dramatic Readings are released. The first of the new stories is tentatively called The Banished Creatures and picks up directly from the exciting final scenes of The Rage Beneath.

The Skin Walkers and The Path of Fate are both available to pre-order now.

New Weekly Who Episodes for 2009

It may be a Doctor Who lite year on television for 2009, but you can still get your weekly fix of excitement with the Audio Adventures of Doctor Who. Paul McGann and Sheridan Smith are back as the Eighth Doctor and Lucie for a new series of adventures in time and space. This time, though, the stories will be released for download every Saturday night in half-hour episodes, for sixteen consecutive weeks from Saturday 7th March. Each complete two-part story will subsequently be available on CD as normal, with one a month being released from March. Plus, there will be a bonus ninth adventure which will be released as a Christmas special in December 2009.

The season begins with Orbis by Alan Barnes and Nicholas Briggs, which picks up from the previous season?s cliffhanger in The Vengeance of Morbius. Guest stars for this story include Andrew Sachs (Manuel in Fawlty Towers) as Crassostrea and Laura Solon (Ruddy Hell! It?s Harry and Paul) as Selta.

The Krynoids (The Seeds of Doom, 1976) return in Hothouse, a cautionary ecological tale by Jonathan Morris. Nigel Planer (The Young Ones, The Colour of Magic) plays Alex Marlowe, while Lysette Anthony (Dark Shadows, Dracula: Dead and Loving It) is Hazel Bright.

There?s death and mystery in a small German town in the year 1827 in The Beast of Orlok by Barnaby Edwards. The impressive guest cast includes Miriam Margolyes (Being Julia, Happy Feet, the Harry Potter films) as Frau Tod and Samuel Barnett (The History Boys, Beautiful People) as Hans.

The Doctor and Lucie are then thrown into a war in deep space in Wirrn Dawn by Nicholas Briggs, which sees the return of the parasitic insect monsters from The Ark in Space (1975). Colin Salmon (Hex, Alien vs Predator, Resident Evil, Die Another Day and Dr Moon in Doctor Who: Silence in the Library and Forest of the Dead) is trooper Salway, while Daniel Anthony (perhaps best known as Clyde in The Sarah Jane Adventures) is Delong.

Renowned comics writer and editor Pat Mills contributes the script for The Scapegoat, which is set in Nazi occupied France during World War II. The cast list includes Samantha Bond (Miss Moneypenny in the Pierce Brosnan Bond movies, Ms Wormwood in The Sarah Jane Adventures) as Mother, Clifford Rose (Secret Army, Doctor Who: Warrior?s Gate) as Major Treptow and Paul Rhys (The Cazalets, Hellraiser: Deader) as Max Paul.

Jonathan Morris contributes his second story of the season with The Cannibalists, which is set on a space station in the future. Phil Davies (Bleak House, The Curse of Steptoe, Lucius in Doctor Who: The Fires of Pompeii) plays Titus, Phill Jupitus (Rex the Runt, Never Mind the Buzzcocks) plays Servo while Nigel Lambert (Hardin in the 1980 Doctor Who story The Leisure Hive) is Diode.

The series comes to a climactic conclusion with the two-part The Eight Truths and Worldwide Web by Eddie Robson, in which the Doctor once again faces his Eight Leg adversaries from Planet of the Spiders (1975). Attempting to conquer their arachnophobia for this story are Stephen Moore (Brassed Off, Mersey Beat and Marvin the Paranoid Android in The Hitch-Hikers? Guide to the Galaxy) as Clark Goodman, Sophie Winkleman (Peep Show) as Kelly Westwood and Sanjeev Bhaskar (The Kumars at No 42, Notting Hill) as Dr Avishka Sangakkara.

Dimensions

Big Finish will be in attendance at the Dimensions convention in Newcastle over the weekend of 14th, 15th, 16th November. Present will be John Ainsworth, Nicholas Briggs, Jason Haigh-Ellery and David Richardson with a special appearance by Claire Huckle who played Crystal in the recently released audio version of Doctor Who - The Ultimate Adventure.

Many of the convention guests have appeared in various Big Finish Doctor Who audio dramas - including Trevor Martin who recently re-created his role as the Doctor in Seven Keys to Doomsday.

The Big Finish team will be selling Doctor Who CDs and books throughout the weekend - many at specially reduced prices for the convention.

For more details about the convention, check out the Dimensions Page on the Tenth Planet Events website.

See you there!

Licence Renewed

The ink is still drying on a freshly signed contract between Big Finish and BBC Audio. The new deal allows Big Finish to continue to produce and distribute new Doctor Who audio dramas and dramatic readings until the end of 2010. ?We couldn?t be happier that our licence with the BBC has been renewed,? said Company Director, Jason Haigh-Ellery. ?This is such an exciting time for Doctor Who and we are delighted to be a part of it by making new and exciting adventures for the classic Doctors and their companions?.

New Companion Chronicles

The twelfth and final release of the third season of Big Finish?s Doctor Who: The Companion Chronicles range can now be announced. Strictly speaking, this special release doesn?t actually feature any of the Doctor?s companions. The Mahogany Murderers by Andy Lane, reunites Trevor Baxter as Professor Litefoot and Christopher Benjamin as Henry Gordon Jago (both pictured here) - two very popular characters last seen in the 1977 TV story The Talons of Weng-Chiang. ?This is a reunion that fans of the series have been demanding for literally years,? says series producer, David Richardson. ?We?re delighted to finally make this a reality.?

Recording took place in September, and both actors were thrilled by Lane's script, which stays true to the wit and imagination of Robert Holmes and finds the amateur sleuths on the trail of another mystery in Victorian London. ?It was very good script indeed,? said Christopher Benjamin after the recording. ?Andy Lane obviously knew the characters.?

?It?s as though one has never been away,? added Trevor Baxter. ?From the moment we started reading it, I just felt that we were back.?

Also just added to the line-up of Season 3 of The Companion Chronicles is The Transit of Venus by Jacqueline Rayner. Scheduled for release in the first week of January 2009, the story features William Russell who returns as Ian Chesterton, a role he last played on screen in 1965. The story features the original TARDIS crew as they meet legendary explorer Captain James Cook...

The Companion Chronicles will also be crossing over in to the monthly Doctor Who releases: Scheduled to begin in Spring 2009 is The Three Companions, a special story told in ten-minute episodes. The script has been written by Marc Platt, and the twelve parts will be available as an extra feature on consecutive full-cast plays in the Doctor Who range (ultimately amounting to a two-hour tale). Platt's script will bring together three different eras of the show, and it's confirmed that one of the companions will be Anneke Wills, reprising her role as Polly.

Win a copy of Short Trips: How The Doctor Changed My Life

The latest edition of A Podcast of Impossible Things features interviews with the authors and editor of How The Doctor Changed My Life, and a competition to win copies of the book.

The closing date for entries is 25 October. The podcast also speaks to Robert Shearman about his anthology, Tiny Deaths.

More Wildthymes for Katy

She?s back ? and it?s about gin! Created by novelist Paul Magrs, Iris Wildthyme, transtemporal adventuress returns in four new audio adventures across time and space. Bracing the temporal winds in her trusty bus and accompanied by the ever-loyal Panda (a ten inch tall stuffed bear), Iris travels from the depths of space to the gates of Wonderland and beyond. Iris and Panda will bamboozle and befuddle a host of new friends and enemies while always having time to mix a sharp Gin and Tonic. For Iris Wildthyme, closing time waits for no woman?

Big Finish were delighted to work with former Doctor Who companion Katy Manning once again on a second season of solo Iris adventures when the actress jetted back into the UK earlier this year. Also returning is David Benson as the pithy and witty Panda. Each of the four releases affectionately pastiches a different decade in Doctor Who, from the 1960s to the 1990s.

The first adventure, released in February, will be The Sound of Fear by BBC Books novelist Mark Michalowski, and sees Iris and Panda encounter the deadly Naxians aboard space station Radio Yesterday, along with Iris?s ex-husband, Sam, played by Bernice Summerfield regular, Miles Richardson.

Land of Wonder, by Iris?s creator Paul Magrs, sees Iris exiled to Earth and working with top-secret organization MIAOW to investigate dark happenings in the Underground.

In The Two Irises by Simon Guerrier (BBC Books? The Pirate Loop and The Slitheen Excursion) Panda has not only the return of the Naxians to deal with, but there?s a new Iris aboard the bus ? an Iris who is decidedly male?

The season comes to a dramatic end in the action-packed season finale, The Panda Invasion by Mark Magrs. As San Francisco celebrates the millennium, Iris must save the world from destruction, while Panda faces his evil twin, and all because somebody spilt their gin and tonic?

Iris?s creator, critically acclaimed novelist Paul Magrs, says of Iris?s return to audio:

'It is blissful to have Katy and David back, reprising these roles so delectably, with such effervescence and mellifluous ease. Everyone seems to love these characters and I couldn't be more cockahoop! It's time to get back aboard that magical double decker bus!?

Iris Wildthyme is produced by long-time Big Finish contributors Cavan Scott and Mark Wright, and sees the return of Gary Russell to the Big Finish fold as director.

The series will be available as four single-CDs, released monthly from February 2009 which are available to pre-order now. A special collectors boxset of season two will also be released in February, thus allowing you to get hold of all four plays ahead of their individual monthly release. In addition, the two season one Iris audio dramas can be purchased together with the season two boxset at a further discount.

Free UNIT Adventure for Download

For the whole of September the four-part UNIT mini-series will be available at the special discount price of just £20.00 for all four CDs - that's a saving of £15.00. The series stars Nicholas Courtney as Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart with Siri O'Neal, Nicholas Deal and an appearance by David Tennant in the fourth story as Colonel Brimmicombe-Wood.

To wet your appetite for the full UNIT mini-series, we are giving away the introductory UNIT story, The Coup, absolutely free for you to download and enjoy! Originally available only as a free CD with Doctor Who Magazine, this drama stars Nicholas Courtney and sets the stage for the new UNIT adventures. The UK division of the UNIT prepares to cede its authority to a new organisation... But who is attempting to sabotage the hand-over?

Download The Coup for free and order the UNIT mini-series on CD for just £20.00. But hurry as the price will return to £35.00 on 1st October.

New Quest for the Key 2 Time

Big Finish have released the details for the first three Doctor Who adventures for 2009. Together they form a new three-part mini-series featuring an all new quest for the Key to Time. The Fifth Doctor is joined by a brand new companion called Amy, played by Ciara Janson, but she is a companion with a twist - this time the Doctor is the assistant.

The first episode in this mini-series is The Judgement of Isskar which will be released in January. The Doctor finds himself on a planet where Time stands still. There he meets a woman who is just a few minutes old. She is a Tracer, sent into our Universe by her makers to locate the six segments of the Key to Time. This being without a name wants the Doctor to be her assistant, but she doesn?t tell him the whole truth. Not at first. Their first port of call is Mars, where a society that one day will become Ice Warriors lives in peace and civility.

In February, the second installment, The Destroyer of Delights is set for release and stars David Troughton, son of second Doctor, Patrick Troughton. David will be playing The Black Guardian, a part previously played in the Classic TV series by the late Valentine Dyall. In this adventure, the Doctor and Amy find themselves at an impasse as the search for the Key to Time has stalled: the next segment does not appear to exist anywhere in the Universe. Forced into a temporary alliance with one of his greatest enemies, the Doctor suggests a course of action that is a validation of chaos itself.

The mini-series concludes in March with the release of The Chaos Pool which features the return of Lalla Ward to Doctor Who. The ageless leader of a dying race believes that salvation lies within The Chaos Pool, a place that even the Guardians of Time have been unable to locate.

In their search for the final segment of the Key to Time, the Doctor and Amy become caught in the crossfire. As the end of everything approaches, old friends and enemies reveal themselves and the final battle between the forces of Chaos and Order ignites?

Also available in the New Year will be The Prisoner's Dilemma - a special edition of Doctor Who: The Companion Chronicles that is a cross-over adventure with the Key 2 Time series. This Seventh Doctor story features Sophie Aldred as Ace with Laura Doddington as Zara, who also stars in the Fifth Doctor's Key 2 Time stories.

All of the Key 2 Time adventures will be available on CD and for download, and are now available to pre-order from the site.

DI Menzies, Charley and the Doctor Together Again

The Sixth Doctor and Charley adventure, The Raincloud Man by Eddie Robson, is released in December in which the two travellers are reunited with DI Menzies, as played by Anna Hope (New Earth, Gridlock and The Condemned). Menzies is still having to deal with alien infiltration in Manchester, but the stakes are raised considerably when a mysterious gambling ship arrives in Salford Quays. Big Finish subscribers whose subscription includes The Raincloud Man will also receive the free adventure, Return of the Krotons which features Robert Holmes?s crystalline creatures from The Krotons. The story guest-stars veteran actor Philip Madoc who also appeared in the original Krotons story, although in this new adventure he plays a new character, Cobden, the head of a human colony desperate for a new energy source.

The Black Guardian is Back!

The Black Guardian is back! Big Finish have announced that the Doctor's old enemy, who appeared in the classic series in 1979 and 1983, is returning for its forthcoming Key 2 Time season. The character features in the second story, The Destroyer of Delights, and this time will be played by David Troughton (pictured), son of Second Doctor, Patrick Troughton, who also recently appeared in the TV episode Midnight and the DWM free cover disc Cuddlesome.

"David was a delight to work with on Cuddlesome," says Key 2 Time producer David Richardson, "and when I read Jonathan Clements' script for The Destroyer of Delights I instinctively felt he'd be ideal for a character of such great presence and menace. Fortunately Executive Producer Jason Haigh-Ellery and the director, Lisa Bowerman, absolutely agreed, and David embraced the opportunity to play a Doctor Who icon."

Big Finish has also revealed that the season's opening story The Judgement of Isskar guest stars Raquel Cassidy, from TV's Lead Balloon, Party Animals and Teachers, as the Lady Mesca. The climactic story The Chaos Pool, which is written by Peter Anghelides, also sees the return of Lalla Ward to the audio series.

Dark Shadows Reborn

By Stuart Manning

April 17:

It?s a Big Finish strategy meeting. MD Jason Haigh-Ellery announces he has a plan ? he always has a plan. With the logistics of gathering the Dark Shadows cast for our second series of releases proving especially complicated this summer, we?re now unlikely to record until the end of the year. So, what do I think about us recording some more straightforward dramatic readings to bridge the gap?

It?s a good idea, and coincidence is on our side, as LA-based actress Kathryn Leigh Scott (Maggie Evans) is going to be in London for a month in May. Taking a leaf from the Doctor Who Companion Chronicles, I suggest we use a second reader. Any ideas? Well, actually...

?What about Alec Newman?? I suggest innocently, pretending to sound casual. I?m not, of course. My brain?s whirring away ? it has to be Alec Newman! For the uninitiated, Alec played vampire Barnabas Collins in the 2004 Dark Shadows pilot produced by Warner Bros, and gave a fantastic performance. Ever since seeing it, I?ve been trying to think of a way we could involve him in the Big Finish range, and as we?ll be recording in London, maybe this could be it.

April 18:

David Richardson, Big Finish?s line producer emails. Alec?s interested, subject to seeing some script pages. Yikes! David?s not one to waste time. Unfortunately, I am, so I spend the weekend fretting as I fail to come up with a story. Do we have him play Barnabas? Do we go with a completely new character? Eventually, I decide we?ll do both ? what we need is something that has all the essential qualities of Barnabas, but is a unique personality linked closely with Maggie Evans. Listeners will get a taste of what Alec?s Barnabas might have been, within the context of a new story. So no tall order there, then.

April 21:

So, how will this become a story? Well, if we?re using a two-person format, it?s a spooky voice talking to Maggie, I reason... A voice whispering away inside her head, trying to scare her. And one that might adopt any number of guises. Of course, that?s not really a story, but it?s enough for me to write a few pages of dialogue and email them off.

I also want to explore Maggie?s time at the Windcliff asylum. There?s a pivotal period on the original show, where Maggie?s trying to recover from her ordeal with Barnabas Collins, and I think there?s some mileage to be had there. We can really explore the psychology of being a vampire?s victim, and discover what happened to Maggie in that month or so she spent off-screen. All we need now is for Alec to say yes.

April 23:

And he does! For a moment I?m in total shock, before it sinks in that I need to have two scripts ready within the next two weeks. So, half-enthused, half-panicking, I set to work writing. It?s the usual mixture of inspiration, dead ends and frustration, but I?m generally pleased with how it?s going. After a few late nights spent with the phantom voice in Maggie?s head, I begin to think I?m the one being haunted by it.

I?m currently partway through my work on the second series of Dark Shadows, and I have a problem that?s stumped me for a while. And one lonely evening, whilst fretting over the resolution of The Ghost Watcher, I realize it?s staring me in the face... The bit of series two that?s clogging up the story and doesn?t really work ? it?s the ending I?m looking for. Right ending, wrong story. Problem solved! It moves from one script to the other and fixes both of them in the process.

May 1:

It?s all gone wrong. I?m 10 pages into writing the second script and I?ve hit a wall. My plan from the first meeting was to have Alec play the same character, but set the stories years apart, around Maggie?s two trips to the Windcliff Asylum in 1966 and 1970. We?ll explore Maggie?s changing character, and her reaction to a seemingly unchanging supernatural figure stalking her, I think. On paper, it seems fine, but I soon realize we?re just telling the same story twice. I try moving bits around and throwing myself curveballs, but it?s hopeless. So, reluctantly I admit defeat and go back to the drawing board. The transposed bit of series two is still good, though. That can stay.

So, new story. The asylum stay remains as a plot point, but I decide to relocate the action to Maggie?s offscreen return afterwards, and set it largely in the town of Collinsport. In the series, the action was generally restricted to the Collinwood estate, but here?s a chance to get under the residents? collective skin and find out what makes a remote fishing village plagued by the supernatural tick. Fear, mostly, but the resilience and fortitude of the denizens seems well worth exploring.

But where will Alec fit in? It makes sense to have him play a new arrival, to give us an outsider?s view of Collinsport, and I remember Kathryn telling me a while back that she?d like to do a more romantic story, which gives me a starting point. And then I get a flash of an image ? all movie poster style ? a man in a long coat, walking through a misty night, holding out a hand with a glowing orb in it. I have no idea who he is or what he?s holding, but I suddenly have enough to start writing again.

May 10:

The scripts are nearly finished, and with bleary eyes, they go off to David to distribute to the cast. They?re not the two stories I set out to write, but I?m pleased with them. Clothes of Sand is an abstract, dreamlike tale ? later in the studio, Alec describes it as a ?waking consciousness? ? whereas The Ghost Watcher is a much more linear story, with a wistful edge. The Ghost Watcher is a very late title change ? the scripts go out called The Day of the Dead, which I put in without really thinking, based on one line of dialogue in the pre-titles. Good title, but there?s no day! There are some dead, but they?re out only at night. And Night of the Dead has more than a hint of George A. Romero about it. So, The Ghost Watcher it is. Done.

May 15:

Alec calls me to check the arrangements for tomorrow?s recording. He immediately seems a nice guy, and very enthusiastic, telling me how much he?s looking forward to tomorrow. ?I know a bit about Dark Shadows,? he says conspiratorially. ?Yeah?? I reply. ?I was in a pilot of it,? he confides. I wonder where this is going. ?I played Barnabas,? he reveals modestly, and I detect more than a little pride.

May 16:

Studio days are always over so quickly. Pages pile up on the floor as the takes are called and all the things you wished you?d thought to put in the script swim before your eyes with devastating clarity. But, for once, I?m enjoying the ride. Both Alec and Kathryn are fantastic, and it?s there, whispering to us in the control room, through the speakers - exactly the voice I heard in my head when I was writing.

No wonder Maggie?s scared.

Doctor Who: The Stageplays are coming!

Everyone here at Big Finish is very excited about the new series of Doctor Who Stageplays. All of us have been hard at work on the studio recording, in post production or pulling together more extras than you can poke a stick at.

Hot off the press is the brand new cover for The Ultimate Adventure (Pictured) Starring Colin Baker, Noel Sullivan, Claire Huckle, Nadine Cox and David Banks. To coincide with the release of the cover we also have information on the the extras that will be released with the CD:

The Ultimate Adventure - DISC ONE

Remembering The Ultimate Adventure
A retrospective documentary narrated by Nicholas Briggs -- Stars Colin Baker and David Banks and writer Terrance Dicks recall the making o fthe original stage show, which made its debut at the Wimbledon Theatre in 1989 and then toured the UK.

In Conversation: Nicholas Briggs and Peter Ware
Nicholas Briggs(The Voice of the Daleks) and Peter Ware (assistant editor of Doctor Who Magazine) share their memories of the stage show, and reveal what this audio adaptation means to them.

TheUltimate Adventure - DISC TWO

Remaking The UltimateAdventure
The cast, director and producers reveal how The Ultimate Adventure was reborn on audio, almost 20 years after the original production.

The Making of the Music
TheUltimate Adventure contains three musical numbers, performed for this production by Claire Huckle, Noel Sullivan and Nadine Cox. We follow them during the recording, while Musical Director Darren Lord reveals how the songs were revisited.

Also, to give you a taste of what's in store for you with the Stageplays, we have released the trailers for Seven Keys to Doomsday starring Trevor Martin as the Doctor and The Ultimate Adventure.

Doctor Who: The Stageplays are available to order now and cost £14.99 each. UK customers can pre-order all three plays at the special discount rate of £25.00 if the order is placed before 1st September. After that date, the price increases to £30.00. For prices in other territories, please check the individual product pages. Online download versions will also be available.