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After nearly 60 years, two missing episodes from William Hartnell's First Doctor era have been unearthed. Join us as we discuss the incredible story behind the recovery of parts of 'The Daleks' Master Plan,' a serial that never aired outside the UK, making this find exceptionally rare.
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00:00Hello everybody, Ellie and Sean here for WhoCulture and we have news! There is news in the Who-niverse!
00:09Before I go any further, maybe just put your hopes down or your expectations down just slightly.
00:13I'm not going to tell you that we know when we're going to get season 3, who's going to be
00:16the next Doctor, who's going to be the next showrunner.
00:18Not quite that big of a news story, but I feel still a very exciting news story.
00:25It is, yep.
00:25In the last 60 plus years, there have been episodes of Doctor Who that got lost in time and rediscovered
00:34many years later.
00:35We did not think that at this point in the future, this far in the future, we'd still be finding
00:43more episodes, more lost episodes of Doctor Who.
00:46And yet, two more episodes have been found.
00:50Woohoo!
00:50So exciting!
00:52Obviously, lots of episodes were lost for various reasons.
00:55Mostly because I don't think they thought in 1963, 4, 5, 6, anyway, that it was going to be quite
01:01as big as it is now.
01:04And that people were going to want to re-watch those episodes.
01:10Damage, loss, someone chucked it in a bin somewhere, you know.
01:14They didn't take that much care.
01:16But we have two more installments from the Daleks Master Plan.
01:22Before now, there were three installments of this 12-part serial available that weren't lost.
01:29We had episode 2, Day of Armageddon, episode 5, Counterplot, and episode 10, Escape Switch.
01:37But now, we can add episode 1, The Nightmare Begins, and episode 3, Devil's Planet, to that list.
01:47Because they've been discovered.
01:51I'm really, really, really, really happy with this.
01:53What I'm doing is, I will explain what I'm doing on my phone now in a moment, but there is
01:57a reason.
01:59But this is super, super, super, super cool.
02:02Because, like, for the obvious, we now have recovered episodes.
02:06And we have episodes, like, it's, like, we were talking about this as well just before we were recording,
02:11that I kind of thought, or I think everyone thought, we had recovered what we were going to recover at
02:17this stage.
02:17You know, it's been 63 years since Doctor Who premiered.
02:23And, like, that is incredible.
02:26Like, I've been enjoying, over the last while, some of the, we were talking about this before,
02:33the audio versions of lost episodes.
02:36Like, some of, a lot of Hartnell and Patrick Droughton's episodes.
02:41Like, the video is lost, but the audio remained archived.
02:46So, what I am doing now, or just, that's what I'm just checking to see,
02:50is if the Daleks Masterplan audio existed like that.
02:54Because, yeah, it is bonkers to think that there are people that in 60 years haven't watched this.
03:01I think that the interesting thing here is, so,
03:03the last time old or lost episodes were discovered was in 2013.
03:09And, basically, what happened was episodes would be sold for distribution in other countries.
03:17And then they might be lost here, but then episodes were discovered in a Nigerian TV station in an archive
03:22somewhere.
03:23Just somewhere you'd never expect them to be found.
03:25What's really, really fascinating about this particular discovery is that the Daleks Masterplan was never aired outside of the UK.
03:34It aired on that one date in November 1965.
03:38And that was it.
03:39Or those 12 dates, those 12 episodes aired in November 1965 in the UK.
03:44And that was it.
03:45So, it's very, very, very lucky and rare that you would find episodes that have literally been nowhere else.
03:55So, there is an organisation called Film is Fabulous.
03:59And they work on discovering archived films and different lost things.
04:04Film and TV and the likes of.
04:06And they were donated a collection from a late collector, which I think the article described as, it was ramshackles.
04:14It was, it was not in a great, a great, it was ramshackle.
04:17You know, there were things that were destroyed, things that not, weren't really in a good condition.
04:22And amongst all of those films, just so happened to be these two lost episodes of Doctor Who.
04:29Now, quite why this anonymous person had these reels, nobody knows.
04:36Why he had them.
04:38But the point is that he did have them.
04:39They've been found.
04:40They've been taken.
04:42They've been looked after.
04:44And now, this Easter, we will be able to watch them on BBC iPlayer.
04:50That is seriously, seriously cool.
04:53Like, and they're going to be restored as well.
04:55You know, kind of cleaned up as best they possibly can.
04:58Which is, like, from a historian point of view, that's incredible as well.
05:06Because, actually, another thing.
05:07So, I am still learning things today about Doctor Who.
05:11For example, I didn't know Nicholas Courtney played someone before he played the Brigadier.
05:16You know?
05:17And before you come at me, yes, I realise he was promoted to Brigadier after he first appeared.
05:22I'm saying, you know, Lesbred Stewart.
05:24I mean, he played a character before Lesbred Stewart.
05:26Why hire a new actor when you could just get someone you've had before?
05:30The other thing that I find really fun and just heartwarming about this whole thing is that Peter Purvis, who
05:37played Stephen Taylor in those early episodes of Doctor Who, he was tricked into attending a screening of these episodes.
05:48He was taken under false pretenses to a cinema in Leicester and was told, we found these episodes and we're
05:57going to watch them.
05:58And I quote this because I think his reaction was the best thing I've ever heard.
06:02He said, my flabber has never been so gasted.
06:08Fair play.
06:09Never has the kidnap of an elderly person had such a positive outcome.
06:14No, I mean, this is, this is a little bit, I think it was a story in Toby Hadouk, I
06:18think was the one who organised the surprise.
06:21And I mean, that man is to Doctor Who.
06:26I don't think he has a comparison.
06:27Like he's just, yeah.
06:29But like this is, this is good.
06:31And also he's a cheeky chap, is Peter Purvis.
06:33He was like, oh, this is brilliant.
06:35Maybe I can start getting some royalties.
06:37It's like, yeah, it's actually fair.
06:40Good point.
06:41Good point.
06:41Yeah.
06:41I just think it's, it's just really exciting.
06:45I just can't get my head around the fact that this far away from when those episodes were released,
06:50that we can just find them, that they weren't lost forever.
06:53It just blows my mind.
06:56And also because we only had those three episodes available before,
06:59and it was episode two, five and ten in a 12 part story.
07:03Even though they are on BBC iPlayer and available to watch,
07:06I can't imagine they make much sense next to each other.
07:09Do you know what?
07:10You're sorry.
07:11So I was furiously typing there.
07:13So yes, the audio was preserved.
07:15So that has been available for a while, which is great because it does feel like,
07:19you know, right, we're going to listen to episode one, listen to it.
07:21And then we're going to watch this episode.
07:23And we're going to go back and listen to this episode.
07:24So which, I mean, unfortunately, is still the case for some of the missing episodes of this serial.
07:31But still, I mean, this is just, this is brilliant in a way that I think here is, you know,
07:38Sean's thinking corner.
07:39So, so many people who are coming to Doctor Who now, like in the, in, or even, or since Eccleston,
07:44you know, who, and in fairness, both of us kind of fall into that category as well.
07:52I often joke, like I was around since Sylvester McCoy, but I wasn't watching it.
07:57And it can be hard then to kind of say to people where to start, because technically start with the
08:07third Doctor, because that's where you have the complete recordings onwards, right?
08:11But then you're missing the first two Doctors altogether.
08:15So you can't really do that.
08:16Go back then and watch On an Earthly Child, if you can.
08:22You won't be watching it on an iPlayer.
08:23Like the more and more of these are recovered, like it is so important for the history of the show,
08:30but for people who want to watch where Doctor Who started, you know?
08:37So I'm so happy with this.
08:40I won't say, was the last round of lost episodes, it's at least 10 years since the last round of
08:46missing episodes were found.
08:472013.
08:48The last time.
08:50It's the 50th anniversary.
08:52Someone was sitting on that.
08:53Yeah.
08:55That's a little too perfect.
08:57Yeah.
09:01So I imagine it was the same person going like, oh, funny, I found these earlier for the 60th.
09:05But no, like this is, this is cool.
09:07This is brilliant.
09:08Yeah.
09:09And you're right.
09:09I mean, I've made no secret about the fact that I have not watched all of Classic Who.
09:14In fact, I've watched more Classic Who since starting this job with Who culture and kind of really engrossing myself
09:20and ingraining it in my mind than I ever did before.
09:24But there's still a ridiculous amount of Classic Who I have not seen.
09:29But it just makes me really excited that it's available and I can.
09:33And this year I have set myself the challenge to watch more Classic Who.
09:37So the fact that they're finding more episodes of it just gives me even more content to watch.
09:41It's like, you know, super positive.
09:43This is weird.
09:44And then you were just like, you know, there's already enough to get through.
09:48Yeah, no, I think it's really, really great.
09:50It's just people now can go back and watch those things.
09:55And like I said, I know I've said it about three times already, but I just can't believe that in
09:582026 we are still discovering lost episodes.
10:01It's just, it blows my mind.
10:05Well, with that mind blowingness, I can't wait to watch them when they're released.
10:12I'm really excited for it.
10:16And, and yeah, I mean, we all have our favorite Doctors.
10:20Both of our favorite Doctors are slightly more modern, more recent than some of the Classic ones.
10:26But I really have enjoyed what I've seen of Hartnell.
10:29Like really, really, you know, he is, he's the template, isn't he?
10:34Well, that's the thing.
10:35I mean, people might overlook him, but without him, we wouldn't be where we are today.
10:39And I think the thing is as well is now newer viewers, newer viewers, that's fun.
10:44Newer viewers kind of tend to look for at David Bradley instead of William Hartnell.
10:49We've kind of had a recasting of an actor.
10:51So now whenever we, you know, modern viewers think about the first Doctor, you kind of picture David Bradley in
10:56the role as opposed to William Hartnell.
10:59Justice for Richard Herndall in The Five Doctors as well.
11:06But, yeah, like it's an, it's an exciting time.
11:09So hopefully, you know, this is March of 2026.
11:13We know we're getting a Christmas special at some point.
11:17Well, Christmas, I presume.
11:18What I mean by that is that it is happening.
11:21Like I presume it's going to be released on December 25th.
11:24But hopefully what I mean is that this is going to be the snowball of a year of news.
11:29That's what I would, that's what I would really love.
11:31Because this is, I think, this is really, really, really special.
11:33And whatever else comes this year, and I'm sure there'll be up, down, side to side, all sorts of news
11:38and happenings and shenanigans in Doctor Who.
11:42But let us never lose sight of the fact that this is a 63-year-old franchise.
11:49And it was as valid in 1963 as it is now.
11:54Is the pacing a little bit different?
11:55Yeah.
11:56Yeah, it is.
11:57But the stories then were just as much fun, even if they were told in a slightly different way.
12:03So if you haven't so far, I implore everyone, check out the classic Who if you can.
12:10And do check out Hartnell, you know, enjoy it.
12:13Or don't enjoy it, but have fun.
12:16And so obviously for this one in particular, there will be a special screening of these episodes held in London
12:24on the 4th of April.
12:25And then following that, they will be released on BBC iPlayer.
12:28Just Easter is what we're given, just around Easter time, which is, you know, around April.
12:35So not too long to wait.
12:38I'm saying that because I don't know the exact dates that Easter is this year, because it changes every year.
12:43It changes every year, doesn't it?
12:44Yeah.
12:44It can't be like Christmas.
12:45It's just all on the same date every year.
12:47No, they have to change it every year.
12:49Dunday, April the 5th.
12:51There you go.
12:52So around there.
12:53First contact day.
12:54There we go.
12:55We just like to cross those franchises, don't we?
12:58Yeah, we do.
12:59Yeah.
13:00But this is very exciting.
13:01We just had to jump on and tell everybody about this fun and exciting development.
13:06News, finally.
13:08And technically some new episodes of Doctor Who, well, new slash old episodes of Doctor Who in the year 2026
13:13when we thought we would only have one.
13:15So that's fun and exciting.
13:18And we will probably talk about them a little bit more closer to when they release or after they've released.
13:23So, yes, if you do watch these episodes when they release, let us know what you think, how you feel
13:28about William Hartnell.
13:29We'd be very intrigued to know.
13:30And we will do the same because, you know, we will be watching them.
13:33But in the meantime, goodbye, sweeties.
13:37Bye.
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