KEV'S SIXTH DOCTOR WHO CUSTOM SCANNER PROP

All I've got to offer is this. A scratchbuild I made of a scanner used by the sixth Doctor. I made it from a Mettoy walkie talkie toy. Presumably the original was made from one too.

Over and out,

Kevin

UK

WHO FIRED! The Woodsy Wotan Dr. Who Custom - Made Toy Gun Armoury of the 1960's

I'm pleased to be able to show you our home-made Dr. Who toy armoury created thus far.

Its a mixture of 2 home-made toys and 2 original plastic clones, together with repro graphics taken from auctioned examples.

A joint effort between Myself, the toys, and Wotan Bill, the art department. We hope you like them.

 Just two more to go, the Dr. Who Astro Ray Dalek Gun and the Anti-Dalek Disintegrator, which will appear in the new year to complete the group of six we've focussed on from the 1960's. 

A home-made toy version of the Disintegrator has been made and .. proper plastic clones have been found and acquired for both toys, with the help of Terranova47 and Wotan Bill.

Watch this space for WHO 2025!

Boxing Day with the Thals

 Aware that not everyone has had a good Christmas, not by a long chalk - with illness, COVID, leaks and terrible snow storms - I just want to wish you all, allover the globe, a very merry remaining ten days of Christmas.

In my own wider family, my brother and nephew have been struck with Corona, sending them into bedroom isolation. In my immediate family, my Missus, Son in Law. Grandson and granddaughter were all felled by a really nasty cold virus. They powered through and we did spend Christmas together but our Granddaughter was too ill to join in. She went to the Docs this morning and is now on antibiotics and hopefully on the mend for New Year.

Me and the Missus are enjoying Boxing Day at Moonbase, watching first that musical morality tale Oliver Twist, a Victorian Christmas classic and now Peter Cushing's Dr. Who and the Daleks, where Peter C also dresses like a Victorian! 

Produced by AARU - who were they? - we've never seen this Dalek movie before. I wuz 4 in 1965 and never caught it up and my Missus was 2. It seems to be universally disliked according to Wikipedia but we're enjoying it. The Dalek planet landscape of mountains looks great! Is that Skaro?

Seeing a colour Doctor Who flick at the cinema must have been thrilling for young Who fans at the time. Unless of course you were a Thal! Did any of you see it?

Even the Eagle comic gets a look-in at the start, the Doc reading one in his living room. I wonder which edition it was?

 Enjoy the rest of Boxing Day. If you can. 

As the Daleks would say: one day we will climb those stairs too!

KEV'S K9

Kevin's scratchbuilt K9 from Doctor Who. How cool is that!

DOCTOR WHO: SPAWN OF THE GUPPIES

Our friend told us about her fish.

She has about six - guppies and fantails and the like. They're all named after characters from Doctor Who.

There's the Cyberman, Sarah Jane, Luke and more. Sarah Jane and the Cyberman bred and spawned but the other fish ate all the fertilised eggs! They must have been hungry daleks!

Most interesting is the Tardis ornament resting on the gravel floor. 

What do you reckon those fish do when they go in that Tardis?

Have you got goldfish? Have you named anything after a Sci-Fi show?

LEGEND OF THE SEA DEVILS?

Having been abroad over Easter I missed British telly. I see that there was a special called 'Doctor Who: Legend of the Sea Devils'. Was this a documentary of the old classic Seventies run or something in the new fangled series? Being an erstwhile Sea Devil fan I'm curious.

DOCTOR WHERE

I've just been skimming over the long Wiki page about missing Dr.Who TV episodes. My head's spinning like a Dalek on ice! Its a fascinating and convoluted tale of chance and passion as the missing episodes have been searched for across the globe over the many decades and fortunately with some success.

A chap called Ian Levine seems to have been the springboard for early finds in the late 70's and 80's and there's an amazing tale about two BBC staffers buying episodes off each other and giving one or two of them to Ian Levine as they were part of the lost! 

I do love stories like this as many people must do as well judging by the numbers of documentaries and TV segments there have been on the subject. There's even one called The WOTAN Assembly about retrieving that particular series. I haven't seen it.

Finding missing TV reminds me of finding missing toys. I imagine finding anything at all thats been missing is just as exhilarating.

Have you been involved in looking for the missing Dr.Who episodes readers or indeed any missing artefact?

TV21's THE DALEKS REPRINTED

Hi there, I just found a complete set of The Daleks from TV21 at my newsagent! I never had TV 21 as a kid, so this was all new(ish) to me!

Here's the website link.

https://www.doctorwho.tv/news/?article=the-daleks-original-comic-strips-reprint-doctor-who-magazine [November 2020]

Strangely, I remember an episode where the Emperor Dalek falls through a time warp and comes off the worst from a joust with a Knight in armour!

The episode had (I think) a cut away of his interior to illustrate the epilogue where he is being repaired with a warning he will be even more dangerous when complete! 

As this adventure wasn't in this collection, I assume the story must have been in TV Comic or maybe Look and Learn?

One of the featured spacecraft [the Guardian] looked very familiar, and sure enough, a bit of Googling brought up the fact someone else had already made the SpaceX connection! I guess I'm the last kid on the block to notice this!

Did any of you read the Daleks strip as a kid? have you go this reprint collection?

Cheers,
Looey
Oz

TROLL, SNOOPY AND THE DOCTOR

Hi Woodsie,

Following on from your Dam Troll thread this month, here is my wife's Troll and my Snoopy astronaut.

Also here is my red and white Lego with a visit from the Doctor!

Looey

Oz

Den of Geek's History of Folk Horror and Doctor Who

I like folk horror.

Its where superstition, ancient rites, witchcraft and paganism are at the heart of the horror, whether it be a novel or a film. Folk horrors are often set in old rural areas or old buildings and sometimes in the distant past.

Folk horror can be very unsettling and is enjoying a come-back, that's if it ever went away. Modern authors like Andrew Micheal Hurley and my brother Steve Woods revel in folk horror in their current books, Starve Acre and The Last of the Lancashire Witches respectively.

The 1970's was a golden age for folk horror especially on UK TV with the plays like Penda's Fen, Robin Redbreast and Muren.

The 1960's gave us the 'unholy trinity' of films too: Witchfinder General, Blood on Satan's Claw and the twisted daddy of them all, the Wicker Man.

BFI have a great chapter on the genre. https://www.bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/news-bfi/features/where-begin-folk-horror

Its no surprise then that Seventies and later Doctor Who episodes were sometimes folked-up to include folk horror.

There's a neat history of this on Dr. Who on the long-established site Den of Geek.

https://www.denofgeek.com/uk/tv/doctor-who/67688/folk-horror-and-doctor-who-a-history 

Do you like folk horror and does it work in Doctor Who? [of which I've only seen the very early stuff.]

DOCTOR WHO ROBOT ANTI-BODY FROM SCRATCH BY KEVIN D

Hi,

Took some pictures of my robot antibody scratchbuild. These feature in the Matt Smith story 'Let's Kill Hitler'.

They have a much gentler war cry than the Daleks!

'Please remain calm whilst your life is extinguished'.

Take care,

Kevin

UK

KEV'S SCRATCHBUILT TIMELORD IMPULSE LASER

Hi,

Here is the laser I was talking about last week. The original may have used a toy luger but I couldn't find one so scratchbuilt it.

Take care,

Kevin

UK

ELMO KNOCKED ON THE TARDIS DOOR

Elmo called round for his friend the Doctor.

He wasn't in!

At this point Elmo fainted!

Kev's Doctor Who Gallifreyan Staser From Scratch

Since Doctor Who has had a mention on the blog recently, here is a replica Gallifreyan Staser, the sidearm of the Time Lords' Chancellery Guard. 

I made it this month. It features in 80's Dr. Who.

Kevin D

TV CONFIDENTIAL: CROSSROADS TO GALLIFREY

Continuing my ongoing observations of TV and film, here are a few things I've seen in the last week.

Crossroads to Crime: not Sci-Fi but a Gerry Anderson directed film nonetheless. I only saw about a quarter of this black and white crime drama but what I saw I enjoyed. Gritty and pacey, I imagine it was a decent filler in a double bill when it came out in 1960. Gerry was hopefully pleased. Has anyone else seen this film, maybe all of it?

Doctor Who: I watched a full episode last night with Missus Moonbase for the first time in years. I can see why we haven't kept up. OK, I know its a kids' programme but what on Earth has happened to this classic show? Countless uninteresting actors seem to surround the Doctor, who is thus relegated to an unmemorable bit part in a messy plot. Essentially the plot was about a holiday resort that had been built on a lethal planet full of mutant monsters, who had more than a passing resemblance to Rawhead Rex. I did like the monsters but that was all. The plasterboard resort set was terrible, the grey lethal planet surface tedious to the max and the action and dialogue simply awful. Yet the worst thing for me by far was the incessant musak which washes over the entire programme like stellar interference. Its just so much noise and since it never ends its impossible to decipher what the music means. Tension? Suspense? Light relief? Who knows, certainly not the Doctor. And what is with all the wise cracks everyone is making and calling each other mate? What ever happened to brilliant serious and frightening Who like the Sea Devils? No, despite the welcome earthy accent of the new Doctor, a fellow Yorkshire tyke, I shan't be watching it again in a hurry. How do you find it readers?

Mystery and Imagination: I caught the final episode of this old TV play series on Sunday. It was the last show, the Curse of the Mummy. I've seen about four of these now on the great Talking Pictures TV channel. All from the 1960's each of the plays was a TV adaptation of a classic horror or melodrama such as Uncle Silas, Frankenstein, Dracula, the Suicide Club, Sweeney Todd and the aforementioned Mummy, which was in colour. I think I recall this series when I was kid but then again the three channels we had back then were awash with TV plays like Armchair Theater and Play for Today so I may be remembering any number of them. Having read up on Mystery and Imagination this week it appears that many of the shows have been lost in the mists of time, which is a great shame. The ones left can all be found on a Network DVD, which Talking Pictures TV have been showing since November. And they contained hardly any if no music at all! How brave is that! Did anyone else catch any of them?

DOCTOR WHO MAGAZINE - SPECIAL ISSUE - TARGET BOOKS BY TONY K

Just to give you and any interested readers the heads-up, Woodsy!

I was browsing through the magazine shelves at WHSmith, looking for something to quietly pass the time on our summer break. 

I was pleasantly surprised to stumbles across Doctor Who Magazine.

Not something I'd usually be drawn to these days, but this was a Special Edition focusing on Target Books.

Remember them? They were prolific publishers of numerous Doctor Who paperbacks (and hardbacks) during the seventies and early eighties.

Looking at the price I hesitated, but after a quick flick through the pages I could see that the contents justified the £6.99.

It's packed cover to cover with evocative illustrations, well researched information and imagery. 

The magazine explores a myriad of familiar and forgotten themes for seventies kids who time travelled with the BBC, and hunted bookshelves for additional adventures in time and space.

I think it's an essential asset for the Doctor Who fan, and an entertaining and informative insight for anyone else, like myself, who enjoyed those old Target paperbacks. 

 A nice piece to file away for the future.

Tony K

MILLIGAN'S MILL DOWN AT THE BOOT SALE

Its half term so I'm on leave and that means Car Boot Sales! Well, at least one today.

Not a huge one in terms of vintage toys but there's always a few things around.

The funniest thing I saw was an Aladdin figure holding a small grey Thunderbirds pistol! I assume that was for encouraging the genie to work harder!

The most interesting item was a large plastic K-9 issued by the BBC. It may have been a remote control toy but there was no console with it. It didn't look that old and I couldn't find a date underneath. I imagine that there are modern versions of this toy and this may have been one of those.

The seller said that the two ariels it had were hard to find in that condition. The side panels were taped on and the seller said it didn't work. I was sorely tempted but my skills are not up to fixing Doctor Who's inactive dog pal. I left it.

Have you experience of K-9 toys?

There was also a huge bundle of Masters of the Universe buildings: at least two Castle Greyskulls and the other dark purple one who's name I forget, along with a handful of figures. All is a Tesco bag. £35. Again, too much for me and I said goodbye to He-Man.

As usual there were lots and lots of die-cast cars and my Missus spent a handsome pound on a smart Matchbox Speed Kings dragster for me called Milligan's Mill. Its dated 1972 and one I never had I don't think, but I had similar cars as a kid. The body lifts up and a small plastic brace flips up and keeps the bonnet high so that the engine is exposed. 

Mine is similar in condition to this one I saw on Ebay. Have you got one or any other Speed Kings?

DALEK PATROL SHIP & PILOT

As the hotly anticipated new series of Doctor Who featuring Peter Capaldi  is due to air next month I though it’s time to give some Who merchandise a mention.

Generally speaking Who merchandise for me means  Daleks, and my latest acquisition is this Dalek Patrol Ship complete with pilot.

As far as I’m aware  this particular Patrol Ship first appeared in the fiftieth anniversary special  ‘Day Of The Doctor’.

 It has a spring loaded firing cannon on top, and removable armoured panels.

It’s scaled to the 3.75” series and comes with its own pilot.

It’s a perfect complimentary vehicle to the previously released Dalek Hoverbout.

Scratchbuilt Cybergun Prop from Doctor Who's The Five Doctors by Kevin D

Hi,

Just finished refurbishing an old model of mine, the Cybermen's gun from 'The Five Doctors'. I've improved the detail on my old model and added better lighting.

take care,

Kevin


Note from Woodsy: You can see the original Martin Bower prop about three - quarters of the way down this page.