h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

A lost 1979 Doctor Who story written by Douglas Adams, founder of h2g2, has been dramatised with a full cast and brand new animated graphics by the BBCi Cult team. Running for six 25-minute episodes, BBCi Cult will be uploading a new episode every week starting today.

Before he became more readily associated with The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams was a script editor and writer for the long-running BBC series Doctor Who. His final contribution to the series was called 'Shada', but when a strike at the Beeb halted filming, the production had to be abandoned uncompleted. Though a compilation of the existing footage was released on video in 1992, it has long since been deleted. But now, thanks to the combined efforts of Big Finish and the BBCi Cult team, fans of both Douglas and Doctor Who can now enjoy a full-cast production of this missing adventure for the first time.

The story contains many links to Douglas' later 'Dirk Gently' novels, and features performances from Paul McGann as the Doctor, John Leeson as robot dog K9 and Lalla Ward, reprising her role as companion Romana, as well as animation courtesy of popular comic book artist Lee Sullivan. It promises an online drama that offers much to Douglas' legion of fans, Doctor Who enthusiasts and anyone who fancies something a little different.

Catch up with the first instalment, read interviews with the cast and crew and download exclusive wallpapers at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/cult/doctorwho/shada/index.shtml

Woohoo! Fantastic stuff from BBCi Cult.

*Looks forward to the day when he can watch it on television as an acted production, and waits just like a snow ball in hell for it . But all the same congratulates the underrated people in the back ground working d*mn hard, with little help, to keep the dream alive *

Woo Hoo. Way to go!

Something else to keep an eye on.

Hath
x

It won't be the same with a replacement Doctor. Tom Baker was one of the best. I don't think I can view any of the BBC online video formats (has never worked before and didn't this time). It really ought to be on TV anyway. The TV scheduling has been even more rubbish this year than ever before. It's time a few daleks were let loose to exterminate those in charge of dropping sci-fi and decent quality science programmes.

PS I do want to know where they got to film any extra footage though. I know that St.John's (DNA's college) wouldn't let them film before and that they had to find a more mercenary one - if that's possible!

Thank Dog it's Friday!!

Bye - I'm off (yes I've heard most of those jokes!) to check this out.

To the backroom boys.

Excelent!!!! Just the thing to enliven up a Friday afternoon

I have to admit, I have been waiting for this for months, since I first heard about it. The only thing better... A new full season in commemoration of 40 years of the Doctor.

It's perhaps a shame that Tom Baker again turned down the chance to take part in this (as he has with a number of other requests from Big Finish to join the other TV Doctors in recreating the role for audio), but to be honest it's an utter joy to hear (and, in animated form, *see*) Paul McGann getting a chance to show us what he might have done had the 1996 TV movie led to a series. It's also great that the Cult team's commitment to the show led them to ask for 'something special' to mark the show's 40th anniversary, and there's not much that's as special as a script by Douglas.

As for the locations, well as the whole thing is animated, Lee Sullivan just drew them in without asking permission first

If you're after a new series, well it's not telly, but Big Finish's adventures with the 8th Doctor continue in November with the first of a new series on CD - 'Zagreus'.

I thought it funny at the time that Douglas was so determined to use the script/plot/location that, having been thwarted with Shada he levered it into the Dirk Gently novel instead. It's also fun knowing how certain aspects of the story fit around specific rooms at the intended location.

You'd better release it on video/DVD some time as that's really the only way I'm going to get to see it if you can't bang enough heads together in the BBC scheduling department.

I've just watched it... it's good fun, even for those of us who are not Doctor or DNA devotees. Nice to see Andrew 'Manuel' Sachs as the bad-guy too.

Are there plans to televise or DVD it for non-web immortality later?

~

Since the character of "The Doctor" is BBC copyright, couldn't they just have got John Culshaw ("Dead Ringers" to voice it?

I tried to watch, but it crashed my copy of Mozilla quite spectacularly. I'll try again soon with a different browser...

Unfortunately not. According to the Q&A on their site, it's part of the Big Finish license that they can only commercially release it as an audio CD (hence why it's specifically written for audio, so you can enjoy it without the graphics).

They've offered people the choice of Flash, just in case the RealPlayer doesn't work, by the way. You might need to download additional (free) software to view it - which doesn't really help Digibox users, I know.

> If you would like to move to the eastern side of the pod, you can have your photo taken overlooking London.
> Don't do it! It's a trap!

I enjoyed watching it and the full screen option is a big improvement on previous Dr Who animations.

I got it to play in IE; rather wonderful.

Just a pain that you can't pause the end credits to read them properly...

Huh, at least you CAN watch it. Real Player doesn't work on my machine - no amount of reloading will get it to operate. I have got Flash on here but whenever I try to play the animation I get a picture of K9 and a message like 'This will only work from it's original location - please reload' or something like that. If only they would use Quick Time.

"...whenever I try to play the animation I get a picture of K9 and a message like 'This will only work from it's original location - please reload' or something like that."

Well, that's a crude attempt to discourage people from saving it to watch off-line later... You'll have your Flash preferences set to not autoplay. Get it to that screen, right-click on the message, then click "Forward" on the drop-down menu. Right-click again and this time click "Play".

I've watched it, I've praised the Cult team, and all that remains is to thank you for telling us about it!

Praise where praise is due.

Fantastic!
Thanks for the early birthday

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