Now: Nineteen Seventy-Three                                                                  

 

Change of Mind       Comic story, published 1995                                                Doctor: 3

featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Liz, with Benton (glimpse), and Paris (informative mention)

Written by Kate Orman.

Takes place principally in Cambridge, sometime after Country of the Blind and self-dated early January.

UNRECONCILED UNIT DATING

It goes as much against the grain to contradict the great Kate Orman as it would to contradict Lance Parkin, but she dates these events 1971, and I cannot.

Walk a Mile in My Shoes      Charity short story, published 2001                        Doctor: 3

featuring the Time Lords, Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Benton, Yates, Jo, with the Ice Warriors (informative mention)

Written by Julian Eales.

informed guess Takes place in the UK. The Doctor is brooding over the events of Doctor Who and the Doomsday Weapon, but from Lethbridge-Stewart’s viewpoint the Master has regained the use of his TT capsule, placing it after The Mind of Evil.

 

It! The Terror from Beyond Space (1958) has manned missions to Mars in 1973, which fits in rather nicely with Doctor Who narrative. True, these Americans call their missions the first and second to Mars, but two and a half years earlier in Moon Shot, the Brits had been calling their mission to the Moon the first. Clearly, chauvinism is a significant factor here all round. It, itself, is plausibly a zoologically close relation to the Ice Warriors.

 

Saucer of Fate     Illustrated short story, published 1972                                      Doctor: 3

featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Jo

Written by the World Distributors 1973 Annual crew.

informed guess Takes place in and near UNIT HQ, between Doctor Who and the Doomsday Weapon and The Three Doctors.

Doorway to Hell   Comic story, published 2017                                                    Doctor: 12

Featuring the Master

Written by Mark Wright.

Takes place partly in London, some time after Be Forgot; self-dated 1973 CE. For the Master, these events take place after Frontier In Space (never a problem, of course, as he has a functioning time machine). It would appear from A Stone of the Heart, The Duke of Dominoes and Legacy of the Daleks that he regenerates into an identical body, as the Doctor does in Journey’s End. (He is certainly vain enough). He may do the same thing at least twice more, after The Dragon of Hyacinth Lodge and The Last of the Gadarene.

White Darkness: Prelude   Illustrated short story, published 1993                   Doctor: 3

featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT

Written by David A McIntee.

informed guess The earlier section takes place in in Philadelphia, Pa., in the first or second decade of the twentieth century; the later takes place on Haiti, arguably on a jaunt across the globe that encompasses Castaway and Dark Intruders.

Philadelphia was the most populous city of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, a landlocked constituent state of the USA, lying south of the state of New York.

Haiti was a republic occupying the west of the island of Hispaniola, in the north of the Caribbean Sea.

Castaway      Comic story, published 1970                                                               Doctor: 3

featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT

Illustrated ?and written by John Canning.

informed guess Takes place in the Caribbean, on Lethbridge-Stewart’s yacht, which I assume the UN is giving him the use of with its characteristic profligacy towards its own employees. arguably between White Darkness: Prelude and Dark Intruders.

Dark Intruders   Illustrated short story, published 1972                                      Doctor: 3

featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Jo, with Mars, the USA (informative mention)

Written by the World Distributors 1973 Annual crew.

informed guess Takes place in the Pacific, near Hawaii, sometime after Doctor Who and the Doomsday Weapon. Lethbridge-Stewart wears a UNIT cap badge on his peaked cap while aboard the aircraft carrier, as he never does in the UK: possibly part of the same protocol that enables him to use the yacht in Castaway. The UK and the USA seem to have settled their differences over Mars missions, as this one has an astronaut from each country.

Hawaii was a constituent state of the USA, occupying an archipelago in the Pacific Ocean far to the west of the North American mainland.

The Claws of Axos   TV story, broadcast 1971                                           Doctor: 3

featuring the Master, Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Benton, Yates, Jo, Axos, with the Time Lords, the USA (informative mention)

Written by Bob Baker and Dave Martin, script edited by Terrance Dicks.

informed guess Takes place principally near the southeast coast of England, as broadcast.

Axos is a sentient, spacefaring metamorphic gestalt parasite, the survivor of a stellar catastrophe that ended life on its planets of origin

United Nations Intelligence Taskforce: Memorandum (i)   Fictional Document, published 1972   Doctor: 3

featuringing Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT

Written by Terrance Dicks and Malcolm Hulke.

Details the Earth-set televised stories from Spearhead From Space to The Claws of Axos.

The Mega   Audio Drama, released 2013                                                Doctor: 3

Featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Benton, Yates, Jo, with the Master (informative mention)

Written by Bill Strutton and Simon Guerrier.

informed guess Takes place in London, and in a central European monarchy close to Vienna, some time between Doctor Who and the Doomsday Weapon and The Three Doctors. 

Vienna was the capital of Austria, a landlocked republic east of Switzerland, southwest of Czechoslovakia and north of Italy.

Lost in the Wakefield Triangle   Audio short story, published 2011                 Doctor: 3

Featuring Jo

Written by Vin Marsden Hendrick.

Takes place in Yorkshire, some time after Doctor Who and the Doomsday Weapon, and during the forced rhubarb growing season, which concludes at the end of March.

Out of the Green Mist      Illustrated short story, published 1973                       Doctor: 3

featuring the Master, Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Yates, Jo

Written by the World Distributors 1974 Annual crew.

informed guess Takes place at UNIT HQ, some time after The Mind of Evil.

Angel   Short story, published 2005                                                                        Doctor: 3

featuring UNIT, Jo

Written by Tara Samms (Stephen Cole).

informed guess Takes place in the Central Middlewich Hospital, presumably in Middlewich, sometime after Doctor Who and the Doomsday Weapon.

Middlewich was a town in Cheshire, a county on the northwest coast of England, lying south of Lancashire and west of Derbyshire.

The Daemons   TV story, broadcast 1971                                                     Doctor: 3

featuring the Master, Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Benton, Yates, Jo, the Daemons, Olive Hawthorne

Written by Robert Sloman and Barry Letts, script edited by Terrance Dicks.

Takes place at UNIT HQ and in Devil’s End, leading up to Mayday, as broadcast. The capture of the Master by UNIT begins the fourth phase of the Doctor’s time as their scientific adviser.

The Daemons are a horned, spacefaring, bipedal, higher evolutionary species with the ability to change size.

Freedom   Short story, published 1998                                                                   Doctor: 3

featuring the Master, Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Benton, Yates, Jo, and the Time Lords (glimpse)

Written by Steve Lyons.

Takes place in the UK, shortly after The Daemons.

Verdigris  Novel, published 2000                                                                    Doctor: 3

featuring the Master, Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Benton, Yates, Jo, Iris Wildthyme, and Liz (glimpse)

Written by Paul Magrs.

Takes place principally in London, regional England and Wales; self-dated May 1973, with which, to my pleasant surprise, I don’t actually have a problem. There was enough activity by maritime Earth Reptiles in The Scales of Injustice to account for the references to Sea Devils. Obviously for the Master these events are happening after The Sea Devils, but as he is in possession of a functioning time machine, this is scarcely an issue. Indeed, if there is a temporal difficulty with his being in proximity to the Doctor “out of sequence”, it gives him a motive to use Verdigris as a catspaw; although it feels a little odd to be looking for cause and effect in a Paul Magrs book.

Degrees of Truth   Short story, published 1998                                                    Doctor: 3

featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT

Written by David A McIntee.

Takes place at UNIT HQ, not long after The Daemons.

Harvest of Time   Novel, published 2013                                                   Doctor: 3

Featuring the Master, Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Yates, Jo, with the Time Lords, the Ice

Warriors, the Judoon (informative mention)

Written by Alastair Reynolds.

Takes place partly in the UK, including London and Scotland, and in the North Sea, soon after The Daemons.

The Thing from Outer Space   Illustrated short story, published 1971              Doctor: 3

featuring UNIT, it would appear

Written by a Countdown/TV Action writer.

informed guess Takes place in Portsmouth, probably after The Daemons.

Portsmouth was an island city in the county of Hampshire, lying on the south coast of England, west of Sussex.

Gardeners’ Worlds   Audio short story, published 2017                                       Doctor: 3

Featuring UNIT, Benton, Yates, Jo

Written by George Mann.

Informed guess Takes place in regional England, after Doctor Who and the Doomsday Weapon and before The Three Doctors.

The Doll of Death   Audio Drama, released 2008                                   Doctor: 3

Featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Benton, Yates, Jo,

Written by Marc Platt.

Takes place in London; dated by the production team between The Daemons and Day of the Daleks.

The Sacrifice of Jo Grant   Audio Drama, released 2019                        Doctor: 3

Featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, the Counter Measures Group, UNIT, Kate Lethbridge-

Stewart, Jo

Written by Guy Adams.

Takes place in Dorset; the earlier events self-dated the June of Jo’s first year in UNIT.

UNRECONCILED UNIT DATING

UNIT files in the early twenty-first century date these events as 1972 CE, which I make a year early.

Dorset is a county on the south coast of England, lying west of Hampshire, south of Wiltshire and east of Devon.

Rags   Novel, published 2001                                                                               Doctor: 3

featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Benton, Yates, Jo, and the Time Lords (glimpse)

Written by Mick Lewis.

Takes place across the west of England, leading up to the summer solstice, after The Claws of Axos.

UNRECONCILED UNIT DATING

Mick Lewis wants these events to be in the early eighties, but is polite enough not to be overinsistent on it. I do have to assume that the death, and indeed career, of Malcolm Owen was some seven years earlier in the Doctor’s continuity than our own. Also, Jo knows about the Daleks and Ogrons three months before meeting them: the Doctor must have mentioned them, or there are events we don’t know about. Horror isn’t really my area, but I applaud Lewis for experimenting with Doctor Who fiction as a vehicle for it, and BBC Books for letting him. As a non-aficionado, I felt there was a thread of thanatic misogyny in this and Combat Rock, but the world is full of female horror fans whose opinion on the subject will be more valuable than mine. All I would say is that I wouldn’t be enormously surprised to learn that he had read the story Smash Hit in the 1973 Doctor Who Holiday Special.

Damascus   Audio short story, published 2016                                                       Doctor: 3

Featuring Jo

Written by Jonathan Barnes.

Takes place in London; self-dated the beginning of July, after Doctor Who and the Doomsday Weapon.

The World Beyond the Trees   Audio short story, published 2017                    Doctor: 8

Featuring Molly, Liv

Written by Jonathan Barnes.

Takes place in London, simultaneously with Damascus.

UNRECONCILED UNIT DATING

Liv later remembers this story as taking place in 1972 CE, but, you know, she could be wrong.

Mary O’Sullivan, known as Molly, is a Tellurian born in 1891 CE.

The Magician’s Oath   Audio Drama, released 2009                                   Doctor: 3

Featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Benton, Yates, Jo

Written by Scott Handcock.

Takes place in London; self-dated July, and set between The Daemons and Day of the Daleks by the production team.

 

The Olympian gods are central to E R Eddison’s Zimiavmian Quartet of novels, a deeply odd fantasy sequence largely written in pastiche Jacobean English, which is gorgeous if you like that sort of thing. Several characters are avatars of Zeus and Aphrodite, most of them unconsciously, which ties in nicely with Deadly Reunion’s suggestion that the Olympians are subject to amnesia. The opening section of The Mezentian Gate (1958) describes the the death of one such avatar of Zeus in the Lofoten Islands in July 1973. The opening section of Mistress of Mistresses (1935) takes place a few hours later, as his body is lying in state.

 

Still Life   Audio short story, releaseded 2019                                                          Doctor: 3

Featuring Jo

Written by Max Curtis.

Informed guess Takes place in the UK, before The Three Doctors. Jo takes leave from UNIT for several weeks after this.

The Senor 105 Adventure Book   Novella, published 2013                      Doctor: 0

Featuring Senor 105, with Canada (informative mention)

Written by Joe Curreri.

Informed guess Takes place in Italy, Mexico, in the Atlantic Ocean, over the Arabian peninsula, in Cambodia and on Easter Island, after Horizon as published. 

The Dominion of Canada was a monarchy occupying most of the northern band of North America, lying north of the USA, west of the Atlantic Ocean, east of the Pacific Ocean and south of the Arctic Ocean.

The Arabian Peninsula lay at the extreme southwest of Asia.

Cambodia was a monarchy of southeast Asia, lying west of South Vietnam.

Easter Island was an island of the southern hemisphere, lying in the Pacific Ocean.

The Iron Circle   Illustrated short story, published 2007                                     Doctor: 10

Featuring Martha

Written by Nicholas Briggs.

Informed guess Takes place on the Isle of Wight; self-dated the summer of 1973 CE.

The Isle of Wight was an island off the south coast of Albion, administratively a county of England.

The Man in the Ion Mask   Comic story, published 1991                                    Doctor: 3

featuring the Master, Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Benton

Written by Dan Abnett

Takes place in the Aylesbury Grange Detention Centre, possibly near Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire, between shortly after Harvest of Time.

UNRECONCILED UNIT DATING

Defiantly self-dated 1976 CE.

The Five Faces of Fear   Novella, published 2013                                          Doctor: 0

Featuring Senor 105

Written by Jay Eales.

Takes place in Mexico; self-dated over a year after early July 1972 CE.

Day of the Daleks   TV story, broadcast 1972                                           Doctor: 3

featuring the Daleks, Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Benton, Yates, Jo, the Ogrons, with China (informative mention).

Written by Louis Marks, script edited by Terrance Dicks.

Takes place about eighty kilometres north of London, as broadcast; self-dated September.

Things That Doctor Who Writers Who Want To Set Things In “The Present” Should Find Difficult To Ignore. Though Quite Likely They’ll Just Pile More Stuff In.

THE SUBSTANTIAL STATELY HOME HOSTING A CONFERENCE VITAL TO WORLD PEACE IS BLOWN TO SMITHEREENS AFTER BEING HURRIEDLY EVACUATED.

United Nations Intelligence Taskforce: Memorandum (ii)   Fictional Document, published 1972  Doctor: 3

featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT

Written by Terrance Dicks and Malcolm Hulke.

Purportedly written after Day of the Daleks.

United Nations Intelligence Taskforce: Memorandum (iii)   Fictional Document,

published 1991                                                                                                           Doctor: 3

featuring the Daleks, Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, the Ogrons

Written by Andrew Dylan.

Purportedly written after Day of the Daleks.

Missing in Action   Illustrated short story, published 1993                                 Doctor: 0

featuring UNIT, Yates

Written by Tim Pieraccini.

informed guess Takes place in the UK, sometime after Day of the Daleks.

The Face of the Enemy   Novel, published 1998                    Doctor: 3 (glimpse)

featuring the Master, Barbara, Ian, Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Benton, the British Republic, Yates, Harry, with the Travers family, Liz, the Counter Measures Group (informative mention), and Jo (glimpse)

Written by David McIntee.

Takes place in London, regional England, Scotland and the Moon, while the Doctor and Jo are away during The Curse of Peladon: as broadcast.

UNRECONCILED UNIT DATING

Events are dated November, but the final weeks of 1973 become insanely busy unless it’s at least a month earlier.

Harry Sullivan is a Tellurian born forty-one years before May, by my calculation, 1991 CE (Harry Sullivan’s War).

Libra: The Switching   Short story, published 2002                                            Doctor: 3

featuring the Master, Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Benton, Yates, Jo

Written by Simon Guerrier.

Takes place in the UK, between The Face of the Enemy and The Sea Devils.

Prisoners of the Lake   Audio Drama, released 2015                        Doctor: 3

Featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Yates, Jo

Written by Justin Richards.

Informed guess Takes place in the UK; dated between Day of the Daleks and The Three Doctors by Justin Richards.

The Science of Magic and Vice Versa (aka Attack of the Gluons) Charity short story, published 2001 Doctor: 3                                                 

featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Benton, Yates, Jo, Olive Hawthorne

Written by Arnold T Blumberg.

informed guess Takes place in the UK, including Devil’s End. The Master is in the custody of Colonel Trenchard, placing this between Libra: The Switching and The Sea Devils.

Gemini Plan   Comic story, published 1971                                                            Doctor: 3

Featuring Venus (informative mention)

Written by Dennis Hooper.

Informed guess Takes place in Wales and the Northern Territory of Australia; between Spearhead from Space and The Three Doctors. The World Army would appear to be an Australian variation on UNIT, though the more familiar version was in place thirty-five years later in The Age of Ice.

UNIT Dating   Audio drama, released 2021                                            Doctor: 8

Featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Liv, Helen, Torchwood, with Jo (informative mention)

Written by Roy Gill.

Takes place in UNIT HQ, implicitly soon after Day of the Daleks.

Torchwood was an institute set up by Queen Victoria to defend the UK from threats

unexplained by contemporary scholarship. It was presumably financed directly by the Crown

rather than the UK government to whom it was not obviously accountable; its authority in

any given case appearing to be more vibes-based than anything else.

The Phaser Aliens   Illustrated short story, published 1972                                 Doctor: 3

featuring Jo

Written by the World Distributors 1973 Annual crew.

informed guess Takes place in Australia, arguably after the Doctor’s arrival there in Gemini Plan. Jo has presumably agreed to be flown out there on the Doctor’s whim, despite the fuss she makes about the environment.

Things That Doctor Who Writers Who Want To Set Things In “The Present” Should Find Difficult To Ignore. Though Quite Likely They’ll Just Pile More Stuff In.

ALL THE WORLD’S DIAMONDS DISAPPEAR.

Hayat   Charity short story, published 2001                                                             Doctor: 5

featuring Tegan, Turlogh

Written by Doris Speed-Keller.

informed guess Takes place in northern Africa, I assume a generation before date of publication.

Tegan Jovanka is a Tellurian born in 1960 CE.

United Nations Intelligence Taskforce: Memorandum (iv)   Fictional Document,

published 1972                                                                                                           Doctor: 3

featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT

Written by Terrance Dicks and Malcolm Hulke.

Purportedly written during The Sea Devils.

The Sea Devils   TV story, broadcast 1972                                                   Doctor: 3

featuring the Master, the Earth Reptiles, Jo

Written by Malcolm Hulke, script edited by Terrance Dicks.

Takes place on and off the English south coast; as broadcast.

 

Red Shift was a 1973 novel by Alan Garner. Events from Roman, Civil War and contemporary Cheshire seem to be telepathically end empathically linked, but it is difficult to pin down how. The overall effect is of a very naturalistic folk-horror, with fantasy crackling away indistinctly, like interference, on the edges. The Roman legionaries are characterised as Vietnam-era US soldiers in an Apocalypse Now state of psychotic breakdown. I would link it to Doctor Who narrative more by sensibility than anything else.

 

Listening Watch   Illustrated short story, published 1991                                    Doctor: 0

featuring UNIT, Benton, Yates, and Lethbridge-Stewart (glimpse)

Written by Dan Abnett.

informed guess Takes place at UNIT HQ; arguably in the Doctor’s absence and arguably before The Claw.

The Claw   Illustrated short story, published 1972                                                  Doctor: 3

featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Yates, Jo

Written by the World Distributors 1973 Annual crew.

informed guess Takes place in Scotland, after the Doctor’s absence from UNIT; arguably beginning with Gemini Plan.

The Monster in the Woods   Illustrated short story, published 2017                 Doctor: 3

Featuring the Daleks, Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Jo

Written by Paul Magrs.

Takes place in the UK; self-dated Hallowe’en, 1973 CE: the impression given that UNIT is quartered in the building that the Doctor will acquire in Where the Heart Is must be misleading.

Storm of the Horofax   Audio Drama, released 2017                       Doctor: 3

Featuring UNIT, Jo

Written by Andrew Smith.

Takes place in the North Sea and in Kent; for the Doctor and Jo, after they have returned from Solos.

The Other Woman   Audio short story, published 2015                                       Doctor: 3

Featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Benton, Yates, Jo

Written by Philip Lawrence.

Informed guess Takes place in Kent, for the Doctor and Jo, after they have returned from Solos.

Primord   Audio Drama, released 2019                                                   Doctor: 3

Featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Liz, the Primords. Jo

Written by John Dorney.

Informed guess Takes place in Cambridge, after The Sea Devils but before The Three 
Doctors.

UNRECONCILED UNIT DATING

It is described as summer, which by my estimation it is only in the southern hemisphere.

The Touch of the Nurazh   Short story, published 2004      Doctor: 3, with 4 (glimpse)

featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, the Master, UNIT, Benton, Jo

Written by Stephen Hatcher.

informed guess Takes place in the UK, for the Doctor and Jo after The Mutants but before The Three Doctors.

Honest Living   Short story, published 1999                                                       Doctor: 3

featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Jo

Written by Jason Loborik.

informed guess Takes place in and near UNIT HQ, some time after Day of the Daleks.

Doctor Who - The Time Monster   Novelisation, published 1986           Doctor: 3

featuring the Master, Atlantis, Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Benton, Yates, Jo, the Chronovores

Adapted by Terrance Dicks, from a script by Robert Sloman.

Takes place near Cambridge; as broadcast. The earlier sections take place on the Thera islands.

UNRECONCILED UNIT DATING

Benton’s cheery greeting of “Happy Michaelmas” must be regarded as wholly facetious.

The Chronovores are dimensionally transcendent beings that are said, as their name unambiguously asserts, to eat time.

Euridyce’s Reprieve  Charity short story, published 2001         Doctors: 1, with 3 (glimpse)

featuring Steven, Katarina, the Chronovores, and Jo (glimpse), with Mars, the outer Solar System, the USA (informative mention)

Written by Greg Gick.

Mostly does not take place at all, occupying a year given to the Doctor, Steven and Katarina by the Chronovores that ceased to have happened immediately after it had happened. The end however takes place on Earth, shortly after Doctor Who – The Time Monster.

Katarina is a Tellurian born a few years before 1240 BCE.

The Ninnies on Putney Common   Short story, published 2013                      Doctor: 0

Featuring Iris Wildthyme

Written by Paul Magrs.

Informed guess Takes in south-west London, Paris and on Mars. Dodie, “a child of the forties” is not too young a spinster, though her mother is still sexually active. She sees what is probably a first-run presentation of a Hammer-style horror film at a pre-multiplex style cinema, so I’m placing this in the early seventies CE.

Paris was the capital city of France.

Doctor Who and the Daleks   Comic story, published 1966                  Doctor: Unbound

featuring Unbound Daleks, Unbound Susan, Unbound Barbara, Unbound Ian

Adapted anonymously from the screenplay adapted by Milton Subotsky from the script by Terry Nation, edited by David Whitaker.

This is a representation of the film the Doctor is watching in A Visit to the Cinema.

A Visit to the Cinema  Illustrated short story, published 1992                           Doctor: 3

Featuring Benton, Jo (informative mention)

Written by Vanessa Bishop.

Informed guess Takes place in a cinema in the UK, during the Doctor’s exile.

The Scream of Ghosts   Audio Drama, released 2019                          Doctor: 3

Featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, the Vardans, Benton, Jo

Written by Guy Adams.

Informed guess Takes place in Kent, after Primord.

Where the Heart Is   Short story, published 1995                                                Doctor: 3

featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Benton, Yates, Jo, Doctor Taltalian, with the Time Lords, Liz (informative mention)

Written by Andy Lane.

informed guess Takes place in London and on the M2, between Doctor Who – The Time Monster and The Three Doctors.

UNRECONCILED UNIT DATING

The Doctor is said to have been employed by UNIT for three years, though by my calculation it is only just over two years since Spearhead From Space. Perhaps it has been dishonestly backdated, for some cunning administrative reason.

Doctor Taltalian is a hexapod Birastrop, with a lifespan of over a millennium.

Talons of Terror   Illustrated short story, published 1973                                    Doctor: 3

featuring UNIT, Jo

Written by the World Distributors 1974 Annual crew.

informed guess Takes place in Yorkshire, between Walk a Mile in My Shoes and The Three Doctors.

Iris Wildthyme and the Land of Wonder  Audio Drama, released 2009                                                                                                                   Doctor: 0

Featuring Iris Wildthyme

Written by Paul Magrs.

Informed guess Takes place in and under London; self-dated 1973 CE.

Poison of the Daleks  Audio Drama, released 2020                              Doctor: 3

Featuring the Daleks, Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Benton, Jo

Written by Guy Adams.

Informed guess Takes place partly in Dungeness, some time after Day of the Daleks. This seems to be the first time Benton leaves linear time, being transported to the planet Balbo in the future by agency of the Daleks.

Dungeness was a headland on the coast of Kent.

Old Father Saturn   Illustrated short story, published 1973                                 Doctor: 3

featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Jo, with Saturn (informative mention)

Written by the World Distributors 1974 Annual crew.

informed guess Takes place at sea, between Walk a Mile in My Shoes and The Three Doctors.

Saturn was at this point the sixth planet from the sun, a gas giant and the second-largest planet of the Solar System, with an extensive moon system.

Morphology   Short story, published 2005                                                            Doctor: 3

featuring UNIT, Jo

Written by Phil Pascoe.

informed guess Takes place at UNIT HQ and in London, some time after Doctor Who – The Time Monster.

Doctor Who - The Three Doctors   Novelisation, published 1975   Doctors: 1, 2, 3

featuring the Time Lords, Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Benton, Jo, Omega

Adapted by Terrance Dicks from a script by Bob Baker and Dave Martin.

Takes place in and around UNIT HQ, as broadcast. At the conclusion of this story, the Time Lords end the Doctor’s exile to Earth and restore his deleted memories, beginning the fifth phase of his time as UNIT’s scientific adviser.

Originally a Gallifreyan and contemporary of the first generation of Time Lords, Omega became an incorporeal being of immense power living within the event horizon of a black hole, following an accident.

Tea for 2   Charity drabble, published 1993                                                       Doctors: 2, 3

Written by Vanessa Bishop.

Takes place during Doctor Who – The Three Doctors.

 

Don’t Look Now (1973) is generally classified as a ghost story, and the male protagonist of the film might indeed fall foul of an N-form at the film’s climax. Generally, though, I would suggest adjacency to Doctor Who through a folk horror/fantasy sensibility, like Red Shift.

 

Iris at the V & A   Short story, published 2013                                      Doctor: 3 (glimpse)

Featuring Iris Wildthyme, with UNIT, Jo (informative mention)

Written by George Mann.

Takes place variously, including in London, on Long Island (an island off the coast of New York state) and at sea, but definitely Iris is with the Doctor at the UNIT Christmas party in 1973 CE.

Who Killed Toby Kinsella?   Audio Drama, released 2016                        Doctor: 0

Featuring The Counter Measures Group

Written by John Dorney.

Takes place in London; self-dated Christmas, 1973 CE.

The Dead Don’t Rise  Audio Drama, released 2016                                      Doctor: 0

Featuring The Counter Measures Group

Written by Ken Bentley.

Takes place in London, immediately after Who Killed Toby Kinsella?

Entertaining Mr.O   Charity short story, published 1998                                        Doctor: 0

Featuring Lethbridge-Stewart, UNIT, Benton, Iris Wildthyme

Written by Paul Magrs.

Informed guess Takes place in London; self-dated 1973 CE, and after, one would imagine, Doctor Who – The Three Doctors.

 

 

Total Stories Considered               372  

Proportion Written By Women    8%                                          

 

Top Docs

3                 120 stories

2                 30 stories  

1                 21 stories

7                 14 stories           

11               10 stories  

10               10 stories  

8                 10 stories  

4                 8 stories             

12               7 stories     Climber!

Unbound   7 stories     Climber!             

6                 6 stories

5                 4 stories             

13               3 stories    

9                 2 stories    

         

         

 

Top Twenty Recurring Elements

 

Alastair and the Lethbridge-Stewart family                                                                                                                                                                                        161 stories

London                                                               113 stories

UNIT                                                                   109 stories

Regional England                                               81 stories           

North America                                                   53 stories

Jo                                                                         51 stories   New entry!

Benton                                                                51 stories   Climber!    

The Travers family                                            49 stories

Liz                                                                        46 stories            

Yates                                                                   38 stories   Climber!    

The Intrusion Counter-Measures Group        27 stories

The Master                                                         26 stories   New entry!

Scotland                                                              26 stories   Climber!

Christmas                                                            22 stories  

The Time Lords                                                  21 stories

At sea                                                                  20 stories   New entry!

Continental Europe                                           19 stories   Climber!    

Senor 105                                                           18 stories  

Iris Wildthyme                                                   17 stories   Climber!

Jamie                                                                   16 stories

 

         

Top Decades

 

The Teens                                                           180 stories

The Noughties                                                    58 stories

The Seventies                                                    52 stories           

The Nineties                                                       33 stories   Climber!

The Twenties                                                     24 stories   Climber!

The Sixties                                                          23 stories  

The Eighties                                                        2 stories

 

And Top Twenty Years

 

2016                                                          33 stories

1970                                                          24 stories   Climber!    

2013                                                          23 stories   Climber!

2018                                                          23 stories   Climber!

2015                                                          21 stories   Climber!

2019                                                          20 stories   Climber!

2011                                                          17 stories  

2017                                                          16 stories   Climber!    

1972                                                          14 stories Climber!

2012                                                          14 stories  

2021                                                          14 stories

2001                                                          11 stories Climber!

2009                                                          9 stories     Climber!

2020                                                          9 stories    

1968                                                          7 stories    

1993                                                          7 stories     Climber!

2005                                                          7 stories     Climber!    

2014                                                          7 stories

1971                                                             6 stories =  New entry!

1998                                                          6 stories =  New entry!

2000                                                          6 stories =

2007                                                          6 stories =  Climber!

2010                                                          6 stories = 

         

         

 

Total Writers (including showrunners, script editors, anthology linking material writers)                                              173

Proportion of Female Writers                         12%      

 

Top Twenty Writers

 

Terrance Dicks                                          21 stories  

Andy Frankham-Allen                             11 stories  

? John Canning                                         10 stories  

Malcolm Hulke                                         9 stories     Climber!    

Mark Wright                                             9 stories     Climber!

John Dorney                                             8 stories     Climber!              

Paul Magrs                                                8 stories     Climber!

Justin Richards                                         8 stories     Climber!

1971 Annual crew                                       8 stories    

Roger Noel Cook                                      7 stories    

Eddie Robson                                            7 stories

Simon Guerrier                                        6 stories     Climber!

David A McIntee                                      6 stories     Climber!

John Peel                                                  6 stories     Climber!    

David Whitaker                                        6 stories             

Andrew Cartmel                                      5 stories    

Matt Fitton                                               5 stories    

Cody Schell                                               5 stories    

1973 Annual crew                                     5 stories     New entry!

Sharon Bidwell                                         4 stories=

Vanessa Bishop                                        4 stories=   New entry!         

Christopher Cooper                                 4 stories=  

Dennis Hooper                                         4 stories=

Steve Lyons                                               4 stories=  

Jonathon Morris                                      4 stories=