Great Unreleased Doctor Who Merchandise of the 20th Century - part 256

The Whomobile Action Pursuit Set - Palitoy - c1974

How cool would this have been? 

Okay. It might be adapted from an old James Bond Thunderball Action Pursuit Set but at least it came with accurate plastic Whomobile, Bessie and police car models. (One-man hovercraft sold separately) 

Sadly all the effort that the toy designers put into this little piece of toy heaven came to nothing. Jon Pertwee was so furious that his image was being used without his knowledge, that he walked out of the Doctor Who television series and was never heard of again. 

No prototypes of this toy are known to exist. Ever.

The Official Doctor Who Garden Fete is Go!

Seems that BBC cutbacks have affected the forthcoming official Doctor Who Festival planned for this November....


Oh..... and NO autographs!!!

Great Unreleased Doctor Who Merchandise of the 20th Century - part twelve

The Sara Kingdom Action Doll - 
circa 1965

I had one of these as a kid - unfortunately it didn't aged well! 

What's this thing for badly drawn Jon Pertwees on advertising stuff?

Jon Pertwee's face appeared on quite a few products during his tenure as the Doctor.

 Some - like the one on the left - are quite disturbing. 

One wonders what the marketing bods back then thought when they gave the go ahead for this artwork for Kellogg's Sugar Smacks... 

Disturbing.

Pertwee also appeared on a recipe book for the Co-op - everyone's favourite local supermarket. I've not seen a complete copy since the 70s but images of the grinning actor extolling the virtues of good food abound on the internet. 

And, whilst it's a more jovial improvement on the 'bogey man' Sugar Smacks artwork, it's still not exactly a Frank Bellamy Radio Times cover is it?

Untranslatable Overseas Doctor Who Novel

Possibly 'Doctor Who and the Invisible Enemy'. 

I dunno...

A Doll To Die For...!

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Hot on the heels of the Taran Wood Beast teddy bear comes this delightful little product from those lovely people at the Little Missy Doll Company.

You really should buy one! 

It will love you to death...

The Question of BBC Question Time's Questionable Merchandise...

Back in the 1970s, the BBC's Question Time was one of the popular television programmes in the UK. Millions tuned in to see a studio audience grill the politicians of the day under the watchful bow tie of Robin Day. The show's popularity spawned a mini-industry of merchandise eagerly snapped up by fans. Presented here is a choice selection from the hey day of "Questiontimemania"...

A series of novelisations penned by some of the UK's top science fiction authors and based on the some of the more dramatic episodes.

Children got a chance to act out their own Question Time episodes with a 'Give-A-Show' Projector set. Very few survived.

For one of their 'Election Special' editions, the Question Time crew were joined by a photographer from the popular Viewmaster company who took dozens of 3D images of the show - including the classic moment when Ted Heath nodded off during a lengthy retort from Jeremy Thorpe. Needless to say, the Conservative Party office were not pleased with Reel 3 / Image 4..... 

The official Question Time LP was a popular number two...

Great Unreleased Doctor Who Merchandise - part nine

In 1965, the popular children's toy manufacturer Chad Valley released a Doctor Who version of its popular 'Give-A-Show' projector. 

This simple toy consisted of a battery operated projector and over a dozen card strips of slides depicting the Doctor's many amazing (and quite compact) adventures on different planets such as Vortis and Skaro.

Here's a modern update that adapts one of the most popular episodes of recent Doctor Who.

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(with thanks to Clayton Hickman)

Doctor Who Video Nasties

Back in the 1980s when the video market was getting off the ground, there were dozens of video labels that produced some really weird releases with covers that bore little resemblance to their desperate contents... 

Here's a selection of classic Doctor Who stories from the 70s repackaged as video nasties for the US market. 

No prizes for correctly guessing the movies' origins...

When Doctor Who hit US news stands in the 1960s

It seems - from recently undiscovered paperwork at the BBC - that Doctor Who WAS nearly sold to US television in the mid sixties. 

A deal was struck with a New York television station to run most of the first season around 1966. 

At the same time, arrangements were made with a local comic book company to reprint some of the better comic strips from TV Comic that had been (loosely) based on the series. 

As all most imported entertainment - it was duly "adapted" for US readers. 

This was mostly done by altering Dr. Who's grandchildren John and Gillian into hipper street kids and also by re-spelling John's name as "Johnnie".

Sadly the TV station had purchased the episodes unseen and was a little put out by their quality. 

It's unclear whether this was to do with the abysmal telerecordings they had been sent or the overall quality of the productions. 

Nevertheless, they cancelled their order within the traditional 28 days grace period and nothing more was said.

This left piles of old comics to gather dust in a warehouse in downtown Manhattan that was eventually blown up in an episode of Kojak in 1974. 

Some of the original issues from this tragic tale survive but there are none known to be in the possession of private collectors. 

You'll never find any of them anywhere... 

...ever!

Great Unreleased Doctor Who Merchandise of the 20th Century - part eight

Doctor Who Slipback - Viewmaster Reels 

GAF - 1986 - Price £1.99 (Woolworths exclusive)

Back when Michael Grade put 'Doctor Who' on hiatus in the mid-eighties, the production team filled in their time by making a radio special that was allegedly broadcast on BBC Radio Four UK. (Few people actually heard it due to the fact it appeared within a kids radio programme that no-one listened to.) 

Having sold two successful sets of 3D reels of Doctor Who for their popular Viewmaster viewing thing, the people at GAF signed up for another set. Alas, the aforementioned 18 month hiatus set in. 

Needing something for the ever approaching Christmas market, GAF sent their photographer to the next best thing... the recording of the radio show. 

Pictures were taken in glorious 3D of the cast and crew at work, play and, in the case of veteran actor, Valentine Dyall, asleep in a large moth-eaten armchair.

The subsequent reels were released in time for Christmas as a Woolworths exclusive. 

In 2008, Woolworths went into administration...

A lesson had been learnt!

Suggested by reader Clayton Hickman - £5 Woolworths Gift Token STAR LETTER

The BBC's Early Attempts at Doctor Who DVDs

Doctor Who fans don't know how lucky they are. Every available story from the show's 50 year run is now available on digitally restored discs. The first DVD was released a decade and a half ago when the fledgling BBC DVD Exploitation Department tentatively dipped its toe into the already rapidly expanding hi-tech market.

As is usual with public corporations, attempts at anything commercial were mired in the lack-of-imagination of the people making the decisions.

Here - for the first time - are three cover proofs of the BBC's early attempts to market Doctor Who as an ongoing series of DVDs. 

As is always the case with any evidence presented on this blog, it never happened that way at all.

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ADDENDUM: A couple of years ago, BBC Video made plans to re-launch the Doctor Who VHS range. Sadly, bosses at BBC Worldwide scuppered the idea when they suddenly realised they still had a VHS department.

More From Those Robot People of the Planet Skaro

Here's a few more pages of Dalek madness from the 1960s....

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(If you can't read the text, you will let me know....!)

Happy 60s Dr Who Halloween!

Kids love Halloween and dressing up as their favourite ghost, ghoul, monster or Marvel superhero. Back in the 60s, there was a couple of Dalek dressing-up costumes available. One consisted of a red plastic vinyl skirt and a cardboard laundry basket and looked as much like a Dalek as it did a Taran Wood Beast... Kids of the 60s were less fussy and put up with it.

There were some other 'Doctor Who' costumes available from the same manufacturer. I've just been up into the loft to hunt mine out ready for the big day next week. 

Alas, they are no longer in their original mint condition. The entire Voord costume has decayed and crumbled to dust as is the case of any cheap latex product. 

And the Zarbi is missing its mandibles. 

As for the Monoid, I bought it off Ebay as an original factory-sealed product for a considerable sum of money. There is something inside it but breaking the seal will lower the value of this highly sought-after collector's item. 

And knowing my luck, there's probably just a crappy 'Star Wars' Emperor costume inside it...

Peter Capaldi: An Apology

Following my posting of an embarrassing photo of the Scottish actor and current star of TV's Doctor Who, I would like to unreservedly apologise to him for any distress caused by the raking up of his sordid past via a picture that he has been trying to distance himself from since 1983.

By way of an apology, the image to the left may cheer him up... and, in turn, prevent further legal action...

Capaldi's Catalogue of Disaster...

The Scottish actor and TV's long running Doctor Who once modelled for a catalogue... 

Honest!

Crossroads novels.... Lots of 'em!

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Malcolm Hulke - the television writer who created the Silurians and the Sea Devils on 'Doctor Who' - was one of the main writers on Crossroads back in the 70s. When his mate Terrance Dicks got the gig to write all those hundreds of novelisations of 'Doctor Who' adventures, he thought he could do the same on 'Crossroads' and badgered the editors at Target Books until they gave in. 

He - and a few friends - managed just over 25 before his typewriter was taken off him. 

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Breaking News: ITV Announces Doctor Who Themed Edition of Popular Quiz Show Revival

Odds stacked against contestant

New: Build Your Own Dalek in Weekly Parts

I love part works - especially the very cheap first issues. 

Thanks to their lovely price tag, I now own a rather nice little figurine of Matt Smith shouting at aliens from 'The Pandorica Opens', a Batmobile from the first Tim Burton film, a top heavy model of the USS Enterprise D and a Victorian pocket watch that doesn't tell the correct time. 

I was lying in bed last night - as you do - and thought wouldn't publishing a part work be an ideal way for the Daleks to invade Earth. I was wide awake and my medication hadn't kicked in. 


No, the idea is reasonably sound. The Daleks have a thing for invading the Earth in the 22nd century. They tried it twice and buggered it up both times thanks to the intervention of TV's favourite Time Lord - the Doctor! 



This time, they publish a part work entitled 'Build Your Own Dalek' - which week-by-week builds not only in a complete library of all things Skaro but also allows the purchaser the 
opportunity to build their own Dalek! 




Obviously, it would take a very long time to supply all the necessary parts - especially the radio active organic bits and pieces. 


But that's the clever bit. By the time all of the part work Daleks are finally constructed, it will be 2150AD (or whatever) and the Daleks would have a ready made army here on Earth without the need for all that flying saucer stuff - which frankly looked kind of rubbish anyway in the original 'Dalek Invasion of Earth'. 


Just an idea anyway... I really should write stories for a living but I get bored easily...

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