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

The Doctor often visits the 'contemporary' UK, except that clearly it is a parallel universe, since no-one there watches him on TV, whereas in our universe, loads of us do. It might be fun to have him visit our strange universe, which is almost the same as his, except that his involvement is entirely as a fictional character.

Traveller in Time walking backwards
"Well, it would be odd when Queen Victoria would recognise him and ask for an authograph

There are people searching for him, < http://www.whoissoctorwho.co.uk >


Oh and by the way < <./>Welcome</.> > to HooToo "

FUP < http://www.whoisdoctorwho.co.uk > is a better link.

Although the Virgin novels aren't necessarily canon (and at this point, does it matter?) there is a reference in a couple to Professor Nightshade. The good Professor is a TV character who, with the aid of companions, fights all manner of unearthly evils.

Mark Gatiss (League of Gentlement, The Unquiet Dead) wrote a novel called Nightshade (for Virgin) in which the 7th Doctor meets the actor who played Nightshade, It's rather good.

Also - in Remembrance of the Daleks we get to see Ace watching TV in a guest house...on a Saturday evening in the UK, in roughly 1963. She turns off what might have been a rather good show, if only we'd seen the opening credits. We know the name of the show starts with 'Doc'.

Nightshade, if I recall, was supposedly a pastiche of Quatermass, the big SF show before DW came along. The New Adventures occasionally mentioned a TV show called Professor X, about a time traveller whose machine was disguised as a post box. The late 1970s incarnation of Professor X was supposedly played by Frankie Howerd.

Inevitably the Professor X show got its own fan site, now sadly defunct...

...as is the website.

Oh, please yourselves.

Think we could possibly get some young and upcoming writer/producer to revive the series so that Professor X could make a welcome return to British screens after a lengthy hiatus?

Awix - p'raps I'm muddled, but I thought the Prof X site came before his mention in the New Adventures.

Hmm - well I only became aware of the site in 96 and the Prof's first on-page appearance I'm aware of was in 1994 (in No Future). But, the NA club being what it was, no doubt the writers were talking about it in zines and emails and whatnot for some time previous to that - Paul Cornell was probably just unable to resist an in-joke (as usual) - so the site may have been there first.

Either way I'll very readily concede I'm no expert on this. Even by DW mythology standards, this is a pretty obscure topic...

Hum. If that was 1994 then it's before I'd been on the internet, so possibly I got the wrong end of the stick.



A little research shows that Prof X was first mentioned in the novelisation of Remembrance of the Daleks, published 1990 (and in a box in the loft, I think).

Don't remember that at all... can't be bothered to skim through it just to check, either! Hey ho.

You know, we're only a few posts away from discussing the discography of Johnny Chess... not that I'm objecting, but let's just be aware of what we're doing, okay?

I left rec.arts.drwho some years back, so I've not had much chance to be this y recently.

I only ever lurked in RADW, thus depriving myself of the chance to chum up with all those NA writers and latterday media pros. Don't even remember where I first read about Johnny Chess, outside the name-check in the last Timewyrm book...

I never managed any chumming-up, but I know some people who did.

It took me a while to remember who Johnny Chess is. He was in the second one of those charity books of short stories. I can't remember what they were called. I'd heard of him before that, though.

I know virtually nothing about Johnny Chess beyond his pedigree - both fictional, and the fact that he was a NA/RADW in-joke for ages. Oh and he gets mentioned in at least one of Cornell's books.

He apparently married Tegan, but they split up because he was a horrible drunkard.

Tegan gets divorced and it *isn't* her fault!?!?!?!?!?!?

Is it usually her fault?

I just meant that if a marriage broke up where one of the parties was a shrill, whinging, impossible-to-please harpy with a history of psychiatric problems (in her case being possessed by papier-mache snakes), I would know whose fault I would assume it to be.

Maybe it was a bit of both - I guess it's covered in some fanfic.

Do you think you can get pills for being possessed by papier mache snakes? I hope they're available on the NHS.