By Any Other Name

By Any Other Name was another storyline submitted by Jerome Bixby, although the writer admitted that on this occasion he had not paid particularly close attention to the series' bible. His tale of aliens from Andromeda wanting to take over our galaxy because of radiation levels was a rather down-beat piece. It was therefore up to script consultant Dorothy Fontana to inject some more humour and conflict into the final draft script, dated Tuesday 7 November 1967. Shooting took place from mid-November ... and the episode debuted on the NBC network on Friday 23 February 1968 when viewers saw the classic sequence in which Mr Scott got one of the Kelvan drunk, one of Fontana's proud additions, for the first time ...

Sorry, wrong series.

There has been much debate recently over what the serial titles for the William Hartnell Doctor Who serials up to and including The Gunfighters are. A new fan must find all this confusing - until they take a quick look at the reference books and realise that even these don't actually line up. There are those who cite the books as bearers of the official titles. There are others who - just as rationally - stand firm for the BBC videos. Others place their faith in documentation, unearthed from musty files like buried treasure. Tradition and popular demand also have staunch supporters. Still more couldn't care less as long as they can get to see the things.

And since the whole thing strikes me as particularly futile and trivial, I feel that I'd be letting the side down if I didn't put my tenpenneth in as well. So for what it's worth (which you'll soon realise is nothing), this is the sorry state that we have got ourselves into over the last 35 years.

So, let's start at the beginning shall we? This is - as somebody once said - a very good place to start. Our journey won't be a strictly chronological one I'm afraid as there are various eras to consider: the Production Era, the Wilderness Era and the Fandom Era. You'll see the problems as they arise. And there will be diversions (clearly signposted) along the way.

SERIAL 'A'

This was originally commissioned on Monday 14 June 1963 from Anthony Coburn simply as Dr Who - with a partial rewrite of some of CE Webber's material. However, with Coburn leaving the services of the BBC, this serial had to be recommissioned as Dr Who and the Tribe of Gum which is identified as a (working title) on the paperwork. Oh... for those of you unsure as to what "working title" means, it means "we don't really like this but it'll do for now as a point of reference and we'll probably come up with something better as we go along". Sometimes they do come up with something better... sometimes they don't. Sometimes they come up with something far, far (far) worse.

The storyline and subsequent story breakdown which hail from late June / early July are simply entitled Doctor Who - First Serial. Clearly, titles were not something of paramount importance to Coburn and the production team at this point. Then we have the revised version of the Doctor Who: General Notes et al document from around this time, which refers to it as The First Story. The Tuesday 2 July planning document by Ayton Whitaker indicates it as being Serial No. 1 and it is not until this is revised on Thursday 18 July that it is again called Dr Who and the Tribe of Gum. Get the idea - frequently we don't need titles at point. It's simply enough to number the serials. After all... we haven't even made any yet. And oh look, here's a document from story editor David Whitaker about the first four serials which calls it First Serial, although somebody has written in The Tribe of Gum alongside it.

Now note this carefully. We've had a first title change. Very slight and minor, but still worth looking at a bit more.

So... back at the plot we're already over 1000 words in, encountered our first problem and because of a cheap gag at the beginning we've not even finished the first serial. Let's press on...

An undated document called Dr Who - Notes of a Preliminary Promotion Meeting from around August gives the first story as Dr Who and the Tribe of Gum but it's back to First Serial on Monday 16 September in a synopsis list from Whitaker. See - the titles just weren't important to the crew, only to people who needed to sell the thing (and of course really sad people who feel the urge to write about it 35 years later). Whitaker is still referring to the scripts by the 'working title' of Doctor Who and the Tribe of Gum on Tuesday 17 September when he receives and accepts them - indeed this is the title on the existing rehearsal script for the first episode. They are described in a late September schedule as Serial 1 about "Paeolithic Man" [sic] - a term or phrase jotted down to give a favour or description of the serial in question rather than a title. This is the first use of what I shall call a 'descriptor' in this article. Pay attention - there will be more, of greater importance than this example. Don't worry though, by early October another scheduling document carries the ever-faithful Tribe of Gum.

So - it's October. Uncle Sydney wasn't that fond of the pilot so we're doing it again and starting to film and record the other episodes. David Whitaker now prepares the Drama Synopsis sheet on the serial. This standard BBC pro-forma has a special area on it headed Serial Title: (Internal Use) to enter a serial title for internal use. And what does Uncle David write in there? Yup... Doctor Who Serial "A".

Then comes the piece of controversy over which so many people have devoted so much time at so many keyboards to so many internet postings. The day that the third episode, The Forest of Fear, goes before the cameras at Lime Grove Studios, somebody has to spoil this relative spell of continuity by issuing Amendment to Promotional Material: "Dr Who" dated 30th July 1963. Dated Friday 1 November it gives details of the first three serials, starting with Dr Who and a 100,000 BC (working title only).

I know, the grammar's shocking isn't it?

Hang on, I hear you say, if they were recording this thing by now, then we have camera scripts. And if we have camera scripts, then we have camera scripts with titles. Sorry boys and girls, but they ain't got titles on them apart from the episode ones. Doctor Who and maybe Serial A. That's your lot. Even the Dr Who and the Tribe of Gum from the rehearsal versions have gone. Oh yes ... to clarify my script terminology for the uninitiated, I shall refer to three versions in order of chronology: a 'draft script' (a rough version typed by a writer), a 'rehearsal script' (the writer's submitted script or more likely a BBC re-type) and a 'camera script' (the director's amended rehearsal script with cuts made and all the technical details added to it).

So, if there's nothing internal for the makers to latch onto, what titles were used at the time for the viewer to get a handle on what was happening? Was there anything in the venerable Auntie-based publication Radio Times? Yes, there was a half-page feature plugging the show entitled Dr Who. No, there wasn't a title there. But what about all those photographs issued to accompany the story by BBC publicity. What was on them? Sorry - just the words Doctor Who and maybe an episode title.

So, in summary, it starts as The Tribe of Gum and becomes 100,000 BC during production.

Except it doesn't end there...

SERIAL 'B'

Terry Nation's justly legendary contribution to TV SF began life as a hastily written storyline headed "The Survivors" a story line for the "Dr Who" series dashed off around the time of a UK tour with Tony Hancock. The storyline had been submitted by Friday 12 July. Hancock fired Nation on the first leg of their tour while in Nottingham the following week. By Wednesday 31 July, the six part version has been scheduled by Whitaker as Fourth Serial and again an obliging scribe has written in The Mutants besides this. This is backed up by a memo of Thursday 8 August in which it is indicated that Doctor Who and the Mutants is now seven episodes. As we've already seen, titles are apt to vanish on internal paperwork and so it becomes Fifth Serial in a Monday 16 September document. It becomes Story 2 in a mid-September schedule, Second Serial on Friday 27 September and subsequently appears at the end of the month as Serial 2 described as "Mutants". Then it changes again...

Around late September/early October, a document entitled Points for Discussion - "Beyond the Sun" by Terry Nation is drafted to highlight concerns about the story; these would appear to be relating to draft scripts and with a director now on board. The title also appears on a scheduling document for around early October which notes it as Mutants/Beyond the Sun; a Friday 11 October memo talks of the Second Serial. Then we have our old friend Amendment to Promotional Material: "Dr Who" dated 30th July 1963 on Friday 1 November which cautiously opts for Dr Who and the Mutants (working title).

Time to check out the camera scripts: Doctor Who - Serial 'B'. Hmmm ... not much for definite there then. The serial gets a mention in Radio Times on Thursday 5 December with the latest set of BBC Drama Synopses for the Deaf - the junior versions of which include "the second 'Dr Who' serial in seven episodes (December 21-February 1)".

Back to the Radio Times and it's now Thursday 19 December. The TARDIS crew will be venturing out into the petrified forest in two days time and there's a Radio Times article entitled Dr Who on the Dead Planet. Okay, so working on the above principle that the 'Dr Who on...' bit can be discarded, that leaves us with The Dead Planet yes? Well, no, because the feature specifies "The opening episode is called 'The Dead Planet'" as if it is purely the episodic title. And before you ask ... I've checked the photos and they don't have a date either ...

So it's probably The Survivors then The Mutants then Beyond the Sun then back to The Mutants. Hmmm - you see how it's not always so straightforward.

Oh yes ... there's a science-fiction fanzine from around this time which reviews the serial and refers to it as The Mutants. So how the hell did they know that?

SERIAL 'C'

As you can see, there's a pattern building up here. Commission, storyline, scripts, production schedules and then the infamous Friday 1 November document. So, to make things really interesting, let's throw the whole lot into reverse. The first that anybody knows about this two-part curio is when Amendment to Promotional Material: "Dr Who" dated 30th July 1963 informs us that the third (and at that time final) serial is to be Dr Who inside the Spaceship (working title) - and judging by the very brief synopsis, nobody's actually written it yet.

Let's take time out again here, because we've got what maybe another exception to the rule of deleting the 'Dr Who...' bit off these documented titles. Dr Who inside the Spaceship makes more sense than Inside the Spaceship - and clearly, given the sketchy nature of the serial at the time - it's more of a description of what's going to be happening in these two episodes due to the budgetary restrictions than a title for general public consumption. So, we have another descriptor.

Anyway the serial then pops up again on a document from Tuesday 7 January 1964 - a week before rehearsals begin on the first episode. This memo by the way is between Donalds Wilson and Baverstock and gives an outline of the untitled Serials C to E. The camera scripts go for the bland epithet Doctor Who - Serial 'C' - and there were no formally issued BBC photographs to coincide with the serial.

Checking through Whitaker's personnel file, there's no formal commission because of course this was a rush job and he was on staff. On Monday 27 January, a memo refers to the serial as plain old Inside the Spaceship (the prefix having been surgically removed), but Whitaker isn't formally cleared to write the scripts as story editor until Monday 10 February ... by which time the thing's going out on BBCtv.

On Thursday 6 February, the Dr Who feature in Radio Times carries a rather nice piccy of the crew in the TARDIS and the text contains a hidden pointer to the title; the introductory blurb says that the traveller's next adventure will take place "inside their unusual space ship". A coincidence of phraseology? Nah.

So. A fairly simple one so far. Looks like it's Inside the Spaceship.

For the moment...

SERIAL 'D'

John Lucarotti's magnificent octopus first appears on schedules as early as the Tuesday 2 July 1963 Ayton Whitaker document - although this is an assumption since at this point it is purely listed as Serial No.3. On Tuesday 9 July, Lucarotti was commissioned by Whitaker for a set of scripts apparently entitled A Journey to Cathay, and went off pleased as punch back to his boat in Corsica to start work for the Beeb. Thus, the revised planning document of Thursday 18 July adds the routine opening words and names Serial No.3 as Dr Who and a Journey to Cathay. As usual, the Wednesday 31 July set of synopses from Whitaker lists it as Third Serial, but the patron saint of researchers has scribbled J. to Cathay in pen in the margin. The August-ish undated Dr Who - Notes of a Preliminary Promotion Meeting also confirm that Dr Who and a Journey to Cathay will be coming out of trap three.

It's still Third Serial on Monday 16 September, Story 3 in mid-September and Serial 3 in late September schedules, where it's described as "Marco Polo 13th Century". Now, it would seem that at this point somebody finds the original title too cumbersome, and suggests that seeing as how we all know who the serial's really about anyway, why don't we take this as the new title. Thus in October, the story is still scheduled as Serial C but now bears the name Marco Polo/Cathay. Now, it has to be said that Marco Polo's nowhere near as beautiful a title as A Journey to Cathay - although it's more likely to get the kids watching. Do we have another instance here of a descriptor becoming a title? Opting for the best of both worlds, the blurb writer in Radio Times for An Unearthly Child's Saturday night debut article (Thursday 21 November) says that a future serial will see the quartet "journeying to far Cathay in the caravan of Marco Polo".

As filming is about to start, the Eastern epic shows up as Serial D on the Tuesday 7 January memo between The Two Donalds. And just when you think it's all settled with the Venetian's name - somebody has to go and send the script for Assassin at Peking out to actress Claire Davenport on Thursday 23 January and tell her that it's the final episode of Journey to Cathay.

Certainly by Thursday 20 January there was no 'journeying to Cathay' any more in Radio Times, as the now obligatory Dr Who article to start each serial tells the un-educated masses that "The early explorers called the Pamir 'the roof of the world', so that is the title of today's episode". It concludes by introducing the Venetian traveller who will go onto fame shortly in his own show Catch Hand: "His name? Marco Polo".

The camera scripts simply proclaim themselves to be Doctor Who - Serial 'D' and an undated Story Details listing from around late February has no titles but instead offers a description: "Marco Polo. 13th Century". The publicity shots fail to bear any titles - but thankfully as memo on Monday 9 March (during the last week of production) - refers to "Episode 6 of Marco Polo", proving that the January Journey to Ms Davenport was probably a momentary hiccup.

So, let's keep it simple here: A Journey to Cathay then Marco Polo.

Now, we need to back-track a bit. I mentioned a late February listing a paragraph or so back, and this covers all the serials already produced and in planning for that first 52 week run. As usual, it doesn't go a bundle on actual titles, but does give a description of the setting for each serial. The first is 100,000 BC - which by a lucky chance happens to be what we settled on as a title. The second is Planet Skaro (Daleks) - nothing like what we've had so far. The third is Inside Doctor's ship. Well, yes... not a million miles away from the popular vote so far. Obviously these are really descriptions... so, hang on, does this mean that 100,000 BC is actually a descriptor? After all, it's not much of a title is it? You may as well call Serial D 1289 AD or Serial H 1794 AD. And The Tribe of Gum does sound better as a bums-on-seats title. So, you see what happens. Just when you think you're sure of something, another bit of yellowing paper flies up and hits you in the face to rip your theories to shreds.

SERIAL 'E'

If you've had trouble following the thread so far - let me assure you that it now gets easier. One almost suspects that the general confusion had by this time caught up with Verity Lambert and her chums ... on top of which they were also now in Spring 1964 and committed to doing quite a few more of these stories about the eccentric old man in the police box. After all, those BEM things have taken off ... and when a twin-world story by Malcolm Hulke seems to be going down the tubes at short notice, who you gonna call? Terry Nation.

The requirement for the serial was discussed on Tuesday 21 January 1964, which is presumably when it was commissioned. The serial is in place on the late February Story Details listing and described as "Planet Marinus", and the Monday 9 March memo refers to "Episode 6 of The Keys of Marinus" to give the serial a name for the first time. There we are - no more of this 'Serial 5', 'Fifth Story', 'Story Five' rubbish from now on! By the time recording starts in mid-March, somebody has thought it would be a good idea to put a name of some sort on the scripts. This is a good move - and hence Serial E is the first Doctor Who camera script to have a title: Doctor Who and the Keys of Marinus on the cover and The Keys of Marinus on the interior pages. Thursday 9 April saw previews in both Radio Times and the Daily Mail. The former had its usual brief Dr Who scene-setting article, but only mentioned that "the first episode [is] called 'The Sea of Death'". The daily press were more useful and hyped the Voord, the new monsters in the serial The Keys of Marinus. There were - however - still no titles on the publicity photographs.

There we go - The Keys of Marinus. I said it would get easier!

SERIAL 'F'

Commission on Tuesday 25 February: The Aztecs (allegedly) Late February Story Details listing: "Aztecs. 5th Century" Wednesday 1 April memo: Doctor Who and the Aztecs Camera scripts: Series F: Doctor Who and the Aztecs

Bingo! The Aztecs. Yes ... Aztecs bingo - tremendous fun! However, it has to be admitted that there is still no title on the publicity photographs ... nor does the Radio Times article (entitled yet again simply Dr Who) let slip any hint of a title on Thursday 21 May. Furthermore, with regards the Story Details document - consider how Aztecs could have arisen from a 'descriptor' of what the story is about. It's simple and to the point. Imagine if Robert Holmes had been script editor - it would have ended up with a title like Pyramid of Blood or something. But no - it's simply The Aztecs.

SERIAL 'G'

Allegedly commissioned from Peter R Newman on Tuesday 25 February as The Sensorites and appearing on the Story Details document from around the same time with the description "Mind Control".

Thursday 20 May has a memo from Newman to his superior which refers to the serial as The Sensorites, and the episodes start recording a week or so later with Dr Who and the Sensorites proudly on the scripts. The BBC's magazine Ariel runs an cover item in its June 1964 issue as Dr Who and the Sensorites, while both a June 1964 schedule and a music costing document from Thursday 2 July concur with Doctor Who and the Sensorites.

There is still a notable lack of titles on the reverse of BBC photographs, but there is a variation to the routine Radio Times piece. This item, dated Thursday 18 June, is entitled Dr Who: Strangers in Space; the title hails from that week's first episode and there is no evidence in the body text to suggest any serial title. But all the same, that's the title of the article and would some people not be therefore justified in using Strangers in Space as the overall name?

All the same, it seems fairly safe to go with The Sensorites.

SERIAL 'H'

Okay - this one is interesting. A "French Revolution" story was discussed on Wednesday 18 March with Dennis Spooner - as noted on Whitaker's Daily Sheet of Monday 16. This led to a formal commission on Thursday 2 April, apparently entitled The Reign of Terror. Whitaker noted that he would be able to prepare a synopsis of the six "French Revolution" episodes on Monday 6 April. Newman's Thursday 20 May memo about studio allocation goes for The Reign of Terror while the Thursday 2 July music costing document uses the variant form Doctor Who + the Reign of Terror. By the time of recording in July, all the camera scripts are neatly entitled The Reign of Terror too. And finally, the notion of titles had even filtered through to BBC publicity, with each 10x8 glossy now blessed with the legend Dr Who and the Reign of Terror on its dorsal side.

But for some reason - there was one department which didn't really like all this The Reign of Terror business. Maybe it wasn't as famous as the revolt which preceded it by 5 years, but somebody at the Radio Times really made an effort not to go with the flow. Or then again - maybe they were working from the early descriptions used by Whitaker in his memos. Whatever the reason, the title of the article which previewed the serial on Thursday 6 August was Dr Who and the French Revolution. There wasn't a mention of the Reign of Terror anywhere, whereas the text again went to lengths to indicate that the travellers find themselves in "the middle of the French Revolution". This apparent stubbornness remained for some time: the article The Return of Dr Who on Thursday 29 October indicated the new serial would begin with the travellers "Where you left them - in revolutionary France" and talked again of "the horrors of the French Revolution". Even in the New Year on Thursday 14 January 1965, the serial was still being referred to as being set during "the French Revolution" in the Dr Who and the Romans article.

So, let's leave this one as most likely being The Reign of Terror, but then again possibly changing to The French Revolution at the eleventh hour.

Right - we're now at the end of Season One in transmission and so we can catch up on pieces of miscellaneous post-transmission paperwork to see if there's any change on our earlier deductions. Well, there's a schedule around June which again gives The Keys of Marinus so that's OK. The music costing document on Thursday 2 July then has The Keys of Marinus and Doctor Who and the Aztecs. Then we have a memo on Tuesday 18 August which uses a few abbreviations, notably Marco Polo/Cathay (see, remnants of the original title are still there a year later), Aztecs and Sensorites. Descriptors coming into play again?

And of course by now, BBC Enterprises are flogging the show around the world as fast as their little film transfer suites can manage. But they'll be using the final transmission titles won't they? They will won't they.

And so to Season Two...

SERIAL 'J'

The serial is interesting because there had been at least two (possibly three) previous incarnations of it. Originally the notion of the miniaturised travellers had appeared in C.E. Webber's The First Story in a document dated Wednesday 15 May 1963 - this was refined the next day as The Giants in the Dr Who - General Notes... document. The Giants kicked around into June when Newman had it canned, and elements were reworked into Serial A (whatever it's called). By Monday 16 September, there was a version by Robert Gould scheduled as Fourth Serial and also referred to on production memos as The Miniscule Story. (Now there's an interesting variation. Is that a title or a descriptor? It was very common on Danger Man to have working titles such as The Geneva Story or The Paris Story until something snappier could be worked out.) By late February, the Story Details document shows that the team still want to do a serial described as "Miniscule" but have no writer. Louis Marks is commissioned on Monday 23 March - the title is not known. Newman's memo of Wednesday 20 May refers to the serial as Miniscule, but again this is most probably a description - not a title. How often must a description be used before it becomes a title?

A memo planning the amount of film in the episodes bears the title Serial J 'Miniscule' while another at the time of recording on Thursday 20 August refers to Doctor Who and the Planet of Giants. The camera scripts are simply Serial J - and the BBC photographic department revert to not captioning their output to any useful degree. A music document dated Friday 28 August comes up trumps though with Planet of Giants. Then we get all the debate over cutting up the last two episodes and sticking them together; in a memo from Wilson to Baverstock on Tuesday 20 October, there is reference to "the four-part serial entitled "The Planet of Giants"" and also to "the "Miniscule" story".

Radio Times for Thursday 29 October carried a number of references to the debut story of the new season. In its Highlights section that week, the publication notes that "The space-time adventurers have reached The Planet of Giants". There is also an extensive article entitled The Return of Dr Who which recaps on Season One and heralds "The adventure on the Planet of Giants starting today ..." before finally declaring once-and-for-all that "the first story is called Planet of Giants". The same issue also offers a batch of Synopses for the Deaf which include "first and second adventures of 'Dr Who' (Oct 31 - Nov 21 and Nov 28 - Jan 2)" - i.e. the four-part version of the serial. By now, the RNID was covering more than one children's serial each issue, and during Season Two Doctor Who would get better coverage alongside The Count of Monte Cristo, Tales from Europe, The Strangers, Alexander Graham Bell, A Tale of Two Cities, Poison Island and Ripcord.

So, in summary shall we say an initial leaning towards Miniscules in the absence of anything else, later stabilising as Planet of Giants. Fortunately this is also the first episode title. Lucky that ...

SERIAL 'K'

Quick off the mark to spot a good thing - and grateful for being dug out of a hole when The Hidden Planet went down - the production office had a Dalek rematch on the books by the time of their late February Story Details listing - this was described as "Daleks threaten earth". The formal commission came on Tuesday 17 March and was apparently entitled simply The Daleks. Yes, well, it's a fair description of the content isn't it? In his Wednesday 20 May memo, Newman refers to the serial as both Daleks and then as The Return of the Daleks - clearly a title of sorts was taking shape. The Return of the Daleks stuck, and is still on paperwork on Thursday 20 August as shooting in London gets underway. However, a music memo dated Thursday 8 October gives the title as The Dalek Invasion of Earth - noting that this is a title change. By this time, recording was underway but the camera scripts bear no title other than the heading Serial K while the publicity photographs taken between August and October and issued in November are entitled Dalek Invasion of Earth. (I have also been reliably informed that some design department material was headed The Daleks in Europe!).

As already noted, the For The Deaf synopses offered in Radio Times on Thursday 29 October included "second adventure of 'Dr Who'" but no title was given. The Thursday 12 November issue promises that 'Next Week' The Daleks Return (not a million miles away from a derivation of the working title) while the cover of the Radio Times the following week was Dr Who and the Daleks. Inside was a feature entitled The Daleks Are Here! which have little clue as to a potential serial title but did refer to "the invasion of Earth".

However, Dr Who and the Daleks will come back to haunt us. On Thursday 2 December, Lambert wrote to a concerned viewer and referred to the first episode of Doctor Who and the Daleks which went out on Saturday 21 November. The preview for the serial's final episode was also entitled Dr Who and the Daleks in Radio Times on Thursday 17 December.

So from a requirement for Daleks leading to The Return of the Daleks and then The Dalek Invasion of Earth ... although maybe it's Dr Who and the Daleks for public consumption. As Mr Hartnell would say if he was still having problems with his lines today, "Hmmmm...."

SERIAL 'L'

Ah-ha - a nice easy one. The draft script in Autumn 1964 from David Whitaker is entitled Doctor Who and Tanni - clearly a descriptor which emphasises the fact that the only function of the two episodes are to introduce the new companion. This was changed by the time of filming to Doctor Who and the Rescue, as given on the publicity document for the serial on Friday 20 November. A late 1964 planning schedule has Dr Who and the Rescue - and For The Deaf sheets offered in Radio Times on Thursday 26 November include "Dr Who and the Rescue (Jan 2 & 9)". December's camera scripts were entitled simply Serial L, but by the time of transmission though, things were consolidated with the article A New Companion for Dr Who? in Radio Times on Thursday 31 December which included the words, "In this new adventure, called 'Dr Who and the Rescue'". Indeed, a revised planning schedule at the time maintains Dr Who and the Rescue - and even the publicity photographs were in agreement with this title.

Little doubt here then - an initial Doctor Who and Tanni and then it's The Rescue all the way...

SERIAL 'M'

Spooner was commissioned for this rather fun comedy on Monday 31 August 1964, apparently under the title The Romans ... and that's the way it stays. Just to go through the motions, the late 1964 schedule has Dr Who and the Romans, the publicity document on Tuesday 1 December has Doctor Who and the Romans, the inner pages of the camera script in December/January have Dr Who and the Romans on their inner pages, it's still Dr Who and the Romans on a January 1965 era planning document, the Radio Times on Thursday 14 January promotes its debut with an article entitled Dr Who and the Romans. Only the BBC photographs remain silent on the subject... but basically, it's The Romans.

SERIAL 'N'

Bill Strutton was commissioned for his surreal tale of giant insects on Monday 28 September with the title being Doctor Who and the Webbed Planet. This version of the title appears to die out early on (but will come back to haunt us - never fear) as on the late 1964 schedule it's The Web Planet. The film schedule is also entitled The Web Planet although the camera scripts opt for plain old boring Serial N (the publicity shots too politely decline any form of title). The Daily Telegraph announces the Zarbi to the world with pictures released from the Ealing film session on Wednesday 6 January and states that the new serial is called The Web Planet - this comes straight from the promotional document issued around this time. At the same time, a revised planning schedule is still The Web Planet. On Thursday 11 February, good old Radio Times gives the Zarbi and Doctor Who a cover slot again with the banner Dr Who on the Web Planet and inside the article confirms beyond a shadow of doubt that Saturday will see "the first episode of 'The Web Planet'".

Thus we have an early The Webbed Planet turning into the less grammatical The Web Planet and staying that way.

SERIAL 'P'

Meanwhile back at the ranch ... Whitaker was apparently commissioned for The Crusade on Sunday 1 November 1964, and it's on the schedules for late 1964 but with no title. By January 1965's schedule, it's become Dr Who and the Crusade and the camera scripts in March are clearly titled Serial 'P' (The Crusade) - although the bracketed title appears to be a later addition. Now, this is where it gets weird. BBC Publicity decide to put names on the photos again ... and those taken for the first episode on Friday 5 March are entitled Dr Who and the Saracen Hordes - while those taken a fortnight later for the third episode are noted as Dr Who and the Crusaders. So what is this - is The Saracen Hordes an earlier working title which the photographic people hadn't caught up with the changes on, or did they suddenly decide during recording that, yes, we'll have a title change, and then two weeks later, yes, we'll have another title change?

By the time we get to transmission, Radio Times on Thursday 18 February promises next week there will be a story "set during the Crusades". But the following week, the article is entitled Dr Who and The Lionheart - another title? After all, King Richard is the prominent feature of the serial. There is no definite serial title in the text, although again there is the phrase "in the days of the Crusades".

Bit of a mess eh? Possibly begins as The Crusade then switches back and forth with doses of The Saracen Hordes and possibly The Lionheart. Hmmmm...

SERIAL 'Q'

Glyn Jones' serial may be badly documented - but it's consistent. Commissioning is obscure, but it was on the late 1964 schedules as The Space Museum and is also listed as such in the January 1965 revisions. The camera scripts read Series 'Q' - The Space Museum - even if there's no name on the photos. The Radio Times on Thursday 22 April then has an article entitled Dr Who and the Space Museum with the reassuring phrases "The new story... 'The Space Museum'" and "'The Space Museum' has been written by Glyn Jones ...".

It's The Space Museum - I think we can agree on that.

SERIAL 'R'

Terry Nation's third Dalek serial was commissioned - appropriately enough - as Doctor Who and the Daleks (III) on Wednesday 16 December 1964. Following the logic of the earlier observations about Dr Who and the Daleks, possibly this makes Serial B Dr Who and the Daleks and Serial K Dr Who and the Daleks (II) on bits of paper that we have yet to find. It was on the schedules by late 1964 but had no title - and had not acquired one by January 1965's revision. The basic outline was submitted to Lambert on Monday 10 January, and it is probably around now that the title The Pursuers is adopted, as this is what appears on the storyline document. However, the descriptor of Dr Who and the Daleks III is still being used on memos about Nation's scripts on Wednesday 24 March - a few weeks before filming by which time the scripts are in. The camera scripts though revert to Serial 'R' - The Chase, supported by the photographs (Dr Who and the Chase), the promotional document (The Chase) and the two offers of For The Deaf Synopses (Dr Who - The Chase 1-3 on Thursday 13 May and Dr Who - The Chase 4-6 on Thursday 10 June). The Radio Times again has the casting vote with its Thursday 20 May issue in which it has an article entitled Dr Who and the Chase and contains the words, "'The Chase', the new adventure which begins today...".

So - Daleks (III) becomes The Pursuers but seems to be most definitely The Chase.

SERIAL 'S'

And so another season draws to a close... with a slightly awkward one. Being another quick in-house job to establish a new companion by the out-going story editor, the commissioning details are very vague (clearance seems to have been given around Monday 15 March). The film schedule and camera scripts both refer to it as Serial 'S' with no title in the May/June period. A document looking at the film content of each episode refers to it as Dr Who and the Monk (David Maloney also commented that the serial was originally called The Vikings until they realised they had more Saxons than Vikings and re-titled it The Saxons... I think we can probably put this one down to a cheap gag - of either period or retrospective origin). The promotional document from around June goes for The Time Meddler, and on Thursday 10 June, Radio Times offered For The Deaf sheets on "Dr Who - The Time Meddler 1-2". The Radio Times preview article, Dr Who, on Thursday 1 July failed to give any clues to a title - nor were there any on the flipside of the photos. But the following week, the For The Deaf advert again confirmed the title when offering storylines to "Dr Who - The Time Meddler 3 and 4".

Therefore, Serial S starts off rather vaguely, was probably The Monk for a while and then became The Time Meddler on a fairly definite basis.

Well, as we've got a few weeks to kill now before the new season, we've got time for a quick round-up of any other bizarre post-production titles which have sprung up during 1964/5.

Alongside the article on The Return of Doctor Who in October 1964, there were a number of photographs from Season One. One of the Sensorites was comfortingly captioned "The Sensorites - the weirdest creatures yet" (which we were already fairly certain about) but that for Serial A is captioned "The first adventure - in the Stone Age". Oh come on ... surely this is just a photograph caption I hear you cry. Yes, that's what I'd say too if it wasn't for the accompanying article also describing the serial as being in "the Stone Age period". I agree that this could be a coincidence, but it seems to be a stock phrase, a mantra almost as repetitive as "100,000 BC" was a year earlier.

The promotional document on The Rescue on Friday 20 November 1964 has a quick biography on writer David Whitaker which includes his previous Doctor Who credit as In the Spaceship - hopefully a typist's minor aberration. Then on Friday 11 December, 1964, that woman Lambert is writing to viewers again, and refers to the first serial as The Paleolithic Age. It's tempting to go "Oi! Lambert! No!" at this point ... but then again there was all this "Stone Age" business about six weeks earlier. Were the production office rewriting history already by this time?

Then there's the promotional document on The Time Meddler around June 1965 which we referred to earlier. This has a biography on director Douglas Camfield in which his previous serials are referred to as Doctor Who and 10,000 BC, Marco Polo and Doctor Who and the Crusades. While the last two are more nice pieces of confirmation - I think we must put the former down to a lack of typing skills by whoever prepared the document, and would seem to discount the earlier fancies of both Radio Times and Ms Lambert.

SERIAL 'T'

Commissioning details for William Emms' serial are a bit on the vague side but would seem to be around March/April 1965. When recording got underway in July, the camera scripts were entitled Serial 'T' Galaxy 4 - even if there was no title on the associated publicity shots. And then we know that there was this weird Dr Who & The Chumblies job at some point too - and indeed the undated schedule points to early July - before recording maybe. However, on Thursday 2 September, the RNID are urging the hearing impaired to get their synopses for "Dr Who four episodes (Sep 11 - Oct 2)" ... but without a title (also on offer this year were Hereward the Wake, The Stranger and David Copperfield). Later on in the same issue of Radio Times though is a plug for next week with "Dr Who Again" and how he lands "on a planet in Galaxy Four". On the previous page, the new boxed item which lists highlights for Saturday's viewing with Friday's listings spotlights the show's return with "'Four Hundred Dawns', the first episode of Galaxy 4". The next issue had a hefty article introducing "Dr Who... at the start of a new adventure Galaxy Four" and also noting that "'Galaxy Four' is written by William Emms". Okay - so we may not know if the final word should be letters or a numeral but it comes between 3 and 5 ... and the first word sure as hell is 'Galaxy'.

So then why is John Wiles writing memos on Thursday 14 October just after the bloody thing's gone out querying who created the Drahvins and calling it Dr Who and the Chumblies? Could this mean that the hand-written list - possibly by Mr Tosh - was correct for the September/October period, and that Galaxy 4 had in fact become The Chumblies by this time? Tricky one isn't it?

SERIAL 'T/A'

And if you thought that was bad ... where do you start with a story whose code you aren't even sure of? Look, we'll start with the title first and handle the production mnemonics as a box-out - the title alone seems to have upset people the most anyway.

Tel Nation was commissioned for this one off on Thursday 25 February, apparently under the title of Dalek Cutaway. This is clearly a descriptor and nothing to do with the actual plot (none of the Daleks cut anything away at all during the episode). On Friday 11 June, Barry Jackson was booked on Serial T Ep 4 & Dalek Cutaway. By July, a title has been allocated to this 'Dalek Cutaway' - it will be called Mission to the Unknown. The camera script used in August is entitled Dalek Cutaway - Mission to the Unknown - this would seem to indicate that by now a title has been found for this 'Dalek Cutaway' item, but that 'Dalek Cutaway' is how the crew still know it. The photographs taken in studio are issued as Mission to the Unknown and the article that introduces this one-off instalment in Radio Times on Thursday 7 October is called Dr Who - Mission to the Unknown. Furthermore, the article specifically states "The story, called 'Mission to the Unknown', is written by Terry Nation". Now ... if you look back at earlier serials like Marco Polo, The Keys of Marinus and The Rescue, it is very unusual for the Radio Times to confuse episode titles and story titles. Not to say that it couldn't happen this once. But it would seem to indicate that by this point, Dalek Cutaway has been abandoned and Mission to the Unknown is the kosher item - for both serial and episode.

So then why does the Programme-as-Broadcast entry for the Saturday 9 October refer to it as 'Dalek Cutaway - Mission to the Unknown'? Hey - that's the first mention of PasBs that we've had in this article (probably some sort of a record for me!). How come they've not come up before Andrew? Well - believe it or not - none of the serial titles are given on the PasBs prior to Serial AA barring this one. Up till then it's all Serial 'V' or Serial 'R' or 'L' or just the episode title. However - are PasB's reliable? You can also find PasBs for The Destructors, The Return of the Cybermen and Inferno Episode Nine (tx: Saturday 21 June 1969).

SERIAL 'U'

"DOCTOR WHO" Synopsis of four episodes set in Ancient Greece provisionally entitled: "THE MYTHMAKERS" proclaims Donald Cotton's storyline for his first serial ... and judging by the fact that Steven is still called Mike, I think we can safely date this as late April/early May 1965. Commissioning gets underway for the first two episodes on Thursday 13 May with The Mythmakers - and a memo from John Wiles around the same time refers to the serial as Dr Who and the Mythmakers. The scripts arrive during June and are referred to the same way. The next two episodes are commissioned on Friday 11 June as the now hyphenated The Myth-Makers. Steve Walker has a note referring to dated 28 July 1965. There's no title on the July planning schedule... and we know that in late Summer/early Autumn there was somebody scribbling Dr Who & the Trojans on a bit of paper. By September, the camera scripts are simply Serial 'U' and no name is hinted at on the BBC pub snaps. On Friday 1 October, the BBC drop Mr Cotton a courtesy note to tell him that Dr Who and the Mythmakers will be starting on Saturday 16. Then on Thursday 7 October, the Radio Times Highlights for next Saturday's programmes states clearly that the new serial is "'The Myth Makers', a high comedy set at the time of the siege of Troy". Okay, so the following week the preview article is entitled Doctor Who and the Trojan War, but that's the article, not the serial, and we can turn a blind eye to it, can't we? Unfortunately though, there's another planning schedule covering Serials U, V and W - and with VT numbers allocated up to the third episode of Serial V: this would point towards a date of the first week of October. And lo and behold, Serial U is called Dr Who and the Trojan War. But wait! There's yet another schedule! This one covers Serial U and the first six episodes of Serial V. Since all of these have VT numbers allocated, this would date it as around the final week of October and Serial U is now The Mythmakers again.

It seems that this was therefore always a version of The Myth Makers (its final form) but that things to do with The Trojans and The Trojan War were also options ... or possibly descriptors which got out of hand!

SERIAL 'V'

This mammoth serial is bit trickier since it had two writers - Terry Nation and Dennis Spooner. Dennis got his commission first on Monday 5 July while Terry's came on Friday 16 July - and neither of them apparently had any titles. Mr Nation's script were written over the summer, and the drafts were entitled simply Twelve-Part Dalek Story - the best example of a descriptor yet, beating Dalek Cutaway hands down! Yet as early as Thursday 10 June - even before commissioning - Duggie Camfield was writing correspondence which refers to Dr Who and the Daleks Master Plan, with a memo about the first six episodes on Monday 20 September referring to The Daleks' Master Plan. Gosh - watch that apostrophe vanish and appear as if by magic. There'll be confusion there I'll be bound ...

The promotional document is drafted around Friday 1 October and gives the title as The Daleks' Master Plan. But in the early October schedule, Serial V is called Dr Who and the Daleks (Part IV) and has titles - as transmitted - for all 12 episodes (despite the fact that the decision to change A Switch in Time to Destruction of Time did not come until very late in the day). Oh dear - it's that Dr Who and the Daleks syndrome all over again... Then again, in desperation somebody had called it Dr Who & (Battle of Wits) at one point... or were they getting it confused with the episode of The Time Meddler? Probably - we shall never know ...

The camera scripts from October 1965 to January 1966 are a right mess. None of them have a title on the technical front cover sheet, and those that carry a title are found on the inner pages, generally the first sheet of what was the rehearsal scripts. The title page of the first script has been removed - that's a good start isn't it? The second and eighth are called The Daleks Master Plan. The third, fourth, fifth, seventh and ninth (i.e. largely Mr Nation's) are entitled The Daleks' Master Plan. The sixth and tenth (i.e. Mr Spooner's) are entitled The Dalek Master Plan. The eleventh is Doctor Who and the Daleks' Master Plan while the twelfth has one Dalek going its own way with the grammatically challenged The Dalek's Master Plan. Oh yes - everyone was clearly so confused that they decided it might be safer not to put anything on the publicity photos at all. The same goes for the revised late October planning schedule where it's plain, boring old Serial V.

Meanwhile, the RNID are busy with some titles of its own. On Thursday 28 October, Radio Times offered synopses for "Dr Who - The Daleks' Master Plan (Nov 13,20,27)", well in advance of transmission. Thursday 11 November sees the usual preview article, but with no hint of a title at all apart from the usual Dr Who. The next offer of For The Deaf sheets comes on Thursday 25 November, but now it's for "Dr Who - 'Dr Who and the Daleks' Eps 4-8 (Dec 4 - Jan 1)". The final batch on Thursday 6 January 1966 follows suit with "'Dr Who and the Daleks' 9-12".

SERIAL 'W'

Another debate to bring about the onset of Armageddon in some quarters. Well, the serial was untitled at the point of commission from poor old John Lucarotti on Friday 9 July who - as you recall - believed he'd been dicked around with a treat as a result of misunderstandings by the new production team. Tosh acknowledges delivery of the first drafts on Tuesday 20 July as The War of God ... and it's still The War of God when the second versions are delivered between Tuesday 28 September and Friday 8 October. Yet the undated, unnamed scribblings over this period refer to it as Dr Who & the Massacre of St Bartholomew (Made up). Was this Tosh attempting to stamp his own name on Lucarotti's scripts - scripts which he would ultimately restructure? By the early October schedule, Serial W is entitled The Massacre of St Bartholomew and has writer, director and designer assigned - although the designer is 'G Evans' at this stage (indicating the document is certainly no later than mid-November).

Finally the much revised scripts get to studio in January 1966 as The Massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve - but in an effort to save ink or a strange game of Chinese whispers, the usual publicity photographs end up with the moniker The Massacre of Saint Bartholomew (poor Bartholomew). The Radio Times fail to offer a title with their Dr Who article on Thursday 3 February, but do note that the serial "is soon to culminate in the bloody massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve". Hey, how about that for a title? The Bloody Massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve?

SERIAL 'X'

Paul Erickson's commission came on Thursday 27 May 1965 and was for The Ark - then scheduled as Serial Y (this was before people started scheduling twelve-part Dalek stories). It was still referred to as The Ark during delivery in August to November, and the inner pages of all the camera scripts apart from Episode 2 refer to it as Doctor Who and the Ark. With no other scribbles on schedules or bits of typing paper, it should be fairly easy. But then we have the synopsis For The Deaf. This was offered in Radio Times on Thursday 3 March 1966 as "Dr Who episodes (Mar 5-26)" .... but I have seen a copy of this bloody thing somewhere and am sure that on it it says Dr Who and the Space Ark. This would seem to be supported by the inconclusive titling of the preview article in the same issue: Dr Who and a Space Ark. Did somebody feel at the last moment that The Ark wasn't spacey enough?

SERIAL 'Y'

As recounted, although there's this Dr Who & the Trilogic Game business some time over the summer of 1965, Brian Hayles' much redrafted scripts began life as The Celestial Toymaker for Serial Y on Thursday 29 July 1965. The scripts were delivered as The Celestial Toymaker between Monday 13 September and Thursday 9 December; a memo on Thursday 17 February refers to Dr Who and the Celestial Toymaker. The camera scripts in March/April were clearly entitled Doctor Who and the Celestial Toymaker ... but rather worryingly the preview piece in Radio Times on Thursday 31 March announced "Dr Who plays the Trilogic Game." Had they been privy to the final set of scribbled notes or what?

SERIAL 'Z'

So last ... and by no means least (unless we're looking at the Appreciation Index, in which case it's least by a long way) we have Mr Cotton's wonderful tale of Wild West comedy. It's commissioned on Tuesday 30 November as Dr Who and the Gunfighters, but when the first two scripts are delivered between Wednesday 15 December and Friday 14 January, it's Doctor Who & The Gunslingers. Episodes 3 and 4 come in from Wednesday 26 to Monday 31 January as Doctor Who & The Gunfighters, but then payments are made on Tuesday 22 February as The Gunslingers. Music memos of the period also refer to the serial as Doctor Who and the Gunslingers.

April's camera scripts are all entitled Dr Who and the Gunfighters on the technical cover sheets - and all the inner pages agree apart from the inner page of Episode 2 which is still called Dr Who and the Gunslingers. There's no title in the Dr Who preview in Radio Times on Thursday 28 April, but it is observed that "Today's new adventure sees the space-time travellers back in the days of the Wild West" (remember that - it'll come back to haunt us). The May 1966 edition of Ariel has a photograph of filming from Dr Who and the Gunfighters.

Thank God on Saturday 28 May 1966, everybody tuned into a show which opened with the title captions The Savages Episode 1.

Anyway, what else happened during this period? Well on Friday 1 October we have the promotional document for Serial V with biographies from Mr Camfield and Mr Newbery. They've both worked on Doctor Who before, including serials such as Doctor Who in the Stone Age (what!?), Doctor Who and Marco Polo (okay), Doctor Who and the Crusade (fine) and Doctor Who and the Time Meddler (fine). Now ... think back to that The Return of Doctor Who article in October 1964. You see, I told you that this "Stone Age" business was more than a coincidence ... but you wouldn't listen. Well, now we've another one for Serial A ... and at least this is one that we can all spell. Oh, and Frederick Muller had issued two more hardback novels: Doctor Who and the Zarbi (i.e. Serial N) and Doctor Who and the Crusaders (i.e. Serial P) in October 1965 and March 1966. (The first in 1964 had been the descriptive Doctor Who in an exciting adventure with the Daleks adapted from Serial B - one wonders if follow-ups such as Doctor Who in a moderately exciting adventure with the Voords or Doctor Who in a very cheap adventure with the Moroks were ever on the cards).

So, now we pass into the Wilderness Years - where stories had proper titles on-screen, unashamed for the whole world to see. Presumably BBC Enterprises kept on sending their synopses sheets around the world - while payments against a different set of titles was being made by the copyright department. In May 1973, Target reprinted the first Muller novel in paperback as Doctor Who and the Daleks (that title again!). Then in 1973, Terrance Dicks aided Radio Times with Doctor Who, a special tenth anniversary tribute magazine which would have a list of all the stories. This is the starting point where we'll look at each major reference work and episode guide to be issued or produced in sequence and chart the changes and mutations of popular titles over the years.

DOCTOR WHO

The magazine came out in November 1973, and - determined to cause confusion for the next few years - for the early years the title of each serial was given as the title of the first episode. Hence:

A An Unearthly Child
B The Dead Planet
C The Edge of Destruction
D The Roof of the World
E The Sea of Death
F The Temple of Evil
G Strangers in Space
H A Land of Fear
J Planet of Giants
K World's End
L The Powerful Enemy
M The Slave Traders
N The Web Planet
P The Lion
Q The Space Museum
R The Executioners
S The Watcher
T Four Hundred Dawns
T/A Mission to the Unknown
U Temple of Secrets
V The Nightmare Begins
W War of God
X The Steel Sky
Y The Celestial Toyroom
Z A Holiday for the Doctor

Well ... by the luck of coincidence they got J, N and Q right (and T/A depending on your point of view). And it's interesting that it was from here that A and C were adopted as popular forms too.

A QUICK GUIDE TO DR WHO

This was a document issued by BBC Enterprises in 1974 to say which serials they had on offer ... but naturally it came in two different versions! It listed all the serials up to Planet of the Spiders with a brief indication of content, setting and adversary. It also indicated which serials were available and which were not. How reliable this is remains to be determined - certainly the 'Dr Who &' prefix is used a lot with Dr Who & The Smugglers, Dr Who & The Highlanders, Dr Who & The Ice Warriors. We also have The Fury From the Deep, The Mind Robbers, The Spearhead from Space, The Silurians, The Inferno, The Terror of the Autons, The Claws of Death, The Day of the Daleks and The Invasion of the Dinosaurs. But, I know, it's the Hartnell serials you're interested in. Here we go:

A No Title
B The Mutants
C Beyond the Sun
D Marco Polo
E The Keys of Marinus
F Dr Who & The Aztecs
G Dr Who & The Sensorites
H The Reign of Terror
J Dr Who & The Planet of Giants
K Dalek Invasion of Earth
L Dr Who & The Rescue
M Dr Who & The Romans
N The Web Planet
P Dr Who & The Crusades
Q The Space Museum
R The Chase
S The Time Meddler
T Galaxy Four
U The Myth Makers
[ ] Dalek Cutaway (Mission to the Unknown)
V The Daleks Master Plan
W The Massacre of Bartholomew
X Dr Who and the Ark
Y The Celestial Toymaker
Z Dr Who & The Gunfighters

This is where the erroneous titling of Serial C as Beyond the Sun (really a working title for The Mutants) comes from. These titles are basically the ones which were given on the BBC Enterprises synopses sheets with a couple of minor variations and a further truncation of Serial W to The Massacre of Bartholomew (poor, poor Bartholomew). The second version of this document issued at around the same time has the following differences:

C No Title
T Galaxy 4

So basically somebody got cold feet over Beyond the Sun. Notice how they don't even have the bottle to come up with something for Serial A in the first place. Cowards!

DOCTOR WHO FAN CLUB

Right ... time to backtrack a bit to 1972 when the Doctor Who Fan Club Monthly (later DWFC Mag) started to come out from Keith Miller. A regular feature in the early issues was a retelling (from memory, aided by scraps of BBC information) of the earliest adventures from nine years earlier under the title of Dr Who - In the Beginning (later Dr Who - From the Beginning). Although the contents of the first two issues are not known, Issues 3 to 7 (Apr-Aug 72) covered the second serial, The Mutants, and indeed a review of the Pertwee serial in Issue 4 commented "Oddly enough, this adventure has the same title as the current story in Dr Who - In the Beginning". Issues 8 and 9 (Sep-Oct 72) contained Edge of Destruction: Episode 1 and Brink of Disaster: Episode 2 indicating a lack of story title. Issue 9 then previewed and Issue 10 (Nov 72) contained Dr Who and Marco Polo. However, at this point the format of the magazine was to change, apparently because the incumbent star was unhappy about the coverage given to his predecessors. Issue 11 (Christmas 72) did however have a cover which named the first serial as Unborn Child. This is now recalled by Jan Vincent-Rudzki as an error on his part in informing Keith of some of the results of his own research. By Issue 18 (Oct/Nov 73), Keith was also offering synopses retelling the old serials in the DWFC Paperback Library which included The Dalek Invasion of Earth, The Chase and The Dalek Master Plan - suggesting a source of BBC Enterprises material by this time.

However, we've now caught up with ourselves in 1974 - Issue 20 (Jun/Jul 74) which (with the departure of Mr Pertwee) picks up with the Return of Dr Who - From the Beginning and a quick resume of the stories already covered (some of which hadn't in fact been covered!). Eschewing the incorrect titles from the anniversary special, these were given as:

A Unearthly Child
B The Mutants
C No collective title
D Dr Who and Marco Polo
E The Keys of Marinus
F Dr Who and the Aztecs
G The Sensorites
H The Reign of Terror
J No title
K The Dalek Invasion of Earth

...and sure enough it was with Dalek Invasion of Earth that things resumed in Issue 21 (Aug/Sep 74), continuing with Rescue in Issue 22 (Jan/Feb 75).

Then, some time during Summer 1975, it appears that Keith issued what was intended to be the first in a series of mini-books, The Doctor Who Mini Book which included an episode guide. This ran:

A No title
B The Mutants
C No title
D Marco Polo
E The Keys of Marinus
F The Aztecs
G The Sensorites
H Reign of Terror
J Planet of the Giants
K The Dalek Invasion of Earth
L The Rescue
M The Romans
N The Web Planet
P The Crusades
Q The Space Museum
R The Chase
S The Time Meddler
T Galaxy 4
[ ] Dalek Cutaway
U The Myth Makers
V The Dalek Masterplan
W The Massacre
X The Ark
Y The Celestial Toymaker
Z The Gunfighters

The title for J can be ignored as an error (the individual episode title is also given as Planet of Giants), but the rest of the list would tend to suggest an amalgam of the BBC Enterprises synopses and the second edition of 1974's A Quick Guide to Dr Who.

DWAS SYNOPSIS SHEETS

Although the Doctor Who Appreciation Society didn't open its doors for trading until 1976, back in 1974 a young lad called J. Jeremy Bentham was already compiling his own synopses sheets with cast and credit details from Radio Times researched at his nearby fountain of knowledge, the National Newspaper Library at Collindale. Sure enough, some serials in the Sixties had story titles given in the article, and others were mentioned in newspapers. Thus, he arrived at the following list:

A The Cavemen
B The Dead Planet
C The Brink of Disaster
D The Roof of the World
E The Keys of Marinus
F The Temple of Evil
G The Unwilling Warriors
H The French Revolution
J Planet of Giants
K Invasion Earth 2064 AD
L The Rescue
M The Roman Empire
N The Web Planet
P The Lionheart
Q The Space Museum
R The Chase
S The Meddling Monk
T Galaxy Four
T/A Mission to the Unknown
U The Trojan War
V The Master Plan
W The War of God
X The Ark
Y The Celestial Toymaker
Z The Wild West

Serial E came from the Daily Mail item; Serials B, H, J, L, N, P, Q, R, T, T/A, U and Z took their titles from the Radio Times articles or aspects thereof. Serials D, F towed the line with the Doctor Who special. Serials C, G ... S were the arbitrary selection of episode titles. Serial A was named The Cavemen because there was no better title available and was purely as a necessity. Serial K was a derivation from the cinematic version: Daleks - Invasion Earth 2150 AD (but he got the year wrong). Jeremy cannot recall how he came up with , The Master Plan, The Ark or The Celestial Toymaker and feels that these may have been lucky guesses to convey the flavour of the serial.

TARDIS NO.10

Now when the DWAS set up shop, Jeremy was made head of reference by virtue of all his research. However, the original President, Jan Vincent-Rudzki, recalls that he also had a set of titles of his own which he had managed to acquire from bits and pieces of BBC Enterprises material over the years - including material from Keith Miller. Early issues of what became the society's magazine, Tardis, revealed that there was a great deal of confusion about the Hartnell titles (largely due to the Doctor Who special), particularly amongst the younger fans who were unaware that there had been individual episode titles up to 1966. To clarify these problems, in Issue 10 (September 1976) Jan printed a list of titles which hailed from a number of sources, but now appear more accurate than Jeremy's unaided attempts of two years earlier and were another major step forward in charting the titles - while not 100% reliant on Keith's 1975 listing:

A No Title
B No Title
C No Title
D Marco Polo
E The Keys of Marinus
F The Aztecs
G The Sensorites
H The French Revolution
J Planet of Giants
K The Dalek Invasion of Earth
L The Rescue
M The Slave Traders
N The Web Planet
P The Lionheart
Q The Space Museum
R The Chase
S The Time Meddler
T Galaxy Four
T/A Mission to the Unknown
U The Myth Makers
V The Dalek Masterplan
W The Massacre
X The Ark
Y The Celestial Toymaker
Z The Gunfighters

In comparison to Jeremy's story sheets, Jan's titles seemed a lot more realistic for Serials D, F, G, K, S, U, V, W and Z, although there were clearly still problems with Serial M and the comment (quite wisely in retrospect) that there were no titles for the initial 13 episodes.

Also in 1976, the first DWAS Stinfo (STory INFOrmantion) sheets were issued by Jeremy's department. These were effectively rewrites of some of the BBC Enterprises documents or RNID synopses. The first batch in September 1976 included The Brink of Disaster, The Roof of the World, The Rescue, The Romans, Mission to the Unknown - a mixture of Jeremy's own assigned titles and one of Jan's corrected ones.

THE MAKING OF DOCTOR WHO

The original April 1972 Piccolo imprint of this book by Malcolm Hulke and Terrance Dicks had clearly seen the problem of titles for the early serials coming a mile off - hence the authors side-stepped the issue entirely by presenting the Doctor's adventures as documents prepared by the Time Lords or the Brigadier, and then by giving a story title of writer, director, enemy and serial code without any names at all - and omitting whatever T/A is (in fact the only titles in the whole book are Doctor Who and the Tenth Planet, Invasion, War Games, The Dæmons, The Wheel in Space, The Sea Devils). When Terrance Dicks came to revise the work for Target to publish in December 1976, he decided on a more formal approach and adapted his guide from the tenth anniversary Doctor Who publication - only this time appending overall serial titles. This was very close indeed to Jan's list from Tardis Issue 10, the main changes being:

A An Unearthly Child
B The Dead Planet
C The Edge of Destruction
K Dalek Invasion of Earth
M The Romans
P The Crusaders
V The Dalek Master Plan

For the first three serials, Terrance retained the first episodes as he had done previously (and if he was aware of The Mutants for Serial B would clearly have avoided the confusion with Serial NNN by not adopting this). Serial P was presumably either from the reverse of the second batch of BBC stills - or simply adopted from Target's own reissue of the Muller novel. Serials M and V would appear to be simple corrections from the BBC Enterprises synopses while Serial K can be put down to typesetting or brevity. Even more so than the Tardis list, this was to become the cornerstone for the series as it moved into the next phase - the Fandom Years.

The Making titles kept everybody happy for quite some time in the late 1970s. The Stinfo program from the DWAS continued with The Dalek Invasion of Earth, The Dalek Master Plan in April 1977, The Keys of Marinus in July 1977, Galaxy Four in August 1977, The Chase in May 1978, The Sensorites in September 1978 and The Time Meddler in February 1979. Target published Doctor Who and the Dalek Invasion of Earth in March 1977 (although in a throwback to the tenth anniversary special, the interior pages noted this as being based on Doctor Who and the World's End). Then towards the end of the decade, fandom's sophistication increased and - largely thanks to the further efforts of Jan and Jeremy - some of those scripts and photos and bits of paper from a decade earlier began to be unearthed. The primary discoveries at this time were concerning the first three serials - which nobody had ever been particularly happy with the titles of anyway. Apparently Mark Sinclair of the DWAS Drama Group contacted Anthony Coburn shortly before Coburn died and was informed that Serial A was called The Tribe of Gum (or even The Tribe of Orb). In the meantime, Jeremy came into possession of the initial A Quick Guide to Dr Who from 1974 which suggested Beyond the Sun for Serial C - and at a DWAS Exec meeting at Jan's house it was generally agreed that this title was likely to be the correct one over and above The Edge of Destruction (Jan recalls that Beyond the Sun also appeared on some Radiophonic Workshop documentation for this serial). The Mutants clearly came to light at this time too - but again there was the problem posed by the Baker/Martin serial of 1972. As it was, when the Stinfo on Serial A came out in August 1979, it was headed An Unearthly Child (The Tribe of Gum).

DOCTOR WHO WEEKLY

From October 1979, Jeremy directed the output of his knowledge and research at Marvel Comic's latest assault on the pocket money of the United Kingdom: Doctor Who Magazine. Each serial was storylined - to greater or lesser degrees - over one or two issues and the titles matched The Making of Doctor Who precisely with two exceptions - the received knowledge of Serial C being Beyond the Sun and a strange insistence on Serial P being The Lion Heart. By April 1980, the new editorial powers deemed the feature as being of no interest to the perceived market, and it expired after a heavily rewritten version of Galaxy Four. Meanwhile back at the DWAS, Stinfos included The Celestial Toymaker in May 1980, The Massacre in August 1980 and The Ark in February 1981 as the program was abandoned in the favour of the revised Plotlines from David J Howe.

DOCTOR WHO - AN ADVENTURE IN SPACE AND TIME

With the business from Marvel, Jeremy had now been able to get Cyber Mark Services off the ground and embark upon the legendary reference work Doctor Who - An Adventure in Space and Time, the first issue of which hit the streets of down-town Blackpool in May 1980. Each issue covered a different serial, and the releases were generally monthly in nature. Since the first issue concentrated on the pilot, it was entitled An Unearthly Child with the remaining three episodes in the second release named Tribe of Gum. Serial B was now entitled The Daleks - a fan assigned title because The Dead Planet was clearly wrong, The Mutants was clearly confusing, and after all this was what the Target book was called anyway wasn't it? Serial C was the - by now - regular Beyond the Sun, but something had turned up by early 1981 which made it clear that Serial H was now The Reign of Terror. (I feel Serial E being Keys of Marinus can be put down to oversized letraset than anything else). Jeremy was also now happy to go with Serial P as The Crusade. Moving into 1982, Serial T/A included a note that Mission to the Unknown was "otherwise known by the BBC title of 'Dalek Cutaway'" (adopted from the BBC Enterprises synopsis), Serial V was The Daleks' Master Plan, Serial W's technical notes confusingly observed "Although referred to on the scripts and storyline as 'The Massacre', all BBC scripts and documentation concerning this serial also note its full title, in brackets, as being 'The Massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve'" - and Serial Z saw the only appearance of The Gun Fighters. During this period, Target paperbacks issued Doctor Who and the Keys of Marinus in August 1980. A supplement to An Adventure in Space and Time was offered by 1982 in the form of the Data-Files - more detailed versions of Stinfos. Although the first was untitled, the remainder followed the standard CMS titles. The series ran regularly through the mid to late 1980s, although the final issue, The Time Meddler, did not emerge until 1992.

THE DOCTOR WHO PROGRAMME GUIDE

Another very major work - not to mention labour of love - was Jean-Marc Lofficier's Programme Guide, the first incarnation of which (the May 1981 hardback) is easily my favourite because it doesn't use overall serial titles on the early stories at all (the way God... or at least David Whitaker ... intended!). The listing at the front of the first editions again used the notion of listing first episode titles for reference. However, by the time of October 1981's paperback issue, it had become necessary to add serial titles. In the same way that Jeremy's DWAS synopses and the 1976 Making of had provided much of the basic research, Jean-Marc now tended to adopt the titles from An Adventure in Space and Time (thus he gave Serial A as An Unearthly Child but noted The Tribe of Gum as an alternate title for the final three episodes). However, Serial C reverted to The Edge of Destruction, and Jean-Marc (quite rightly as we now realise) noted that Beyond the Sun was an erroneous alternative title. Since CMS had only got up to mid-second season at the time, the later titles appear to derive from Making of, although Serial V is The Dalek Masterplan. October 1981 also saw Target publishing Doctor Who and an Unearthly Child.

DOCTOR WHO - A CELEBRATION

Peter Haining's first - and probably best - tribute book to Doctor Who hit the shops in September 1983, and included not one but two lists of story titles - a list of serials and also a production personnel table akin to the one from the 1972 The Making of Doctor Who. Both of these were authored by Jeremy Bentham, and - as you would expect - tended to use the titles which he had placed on the covers of the CMS releases. The exceptions were that Serial A was now An Unearthly Child or The Tribe of Gum, Serial B was The Daleks (aka The Dead Planet) and Serial C was The Edge of Destruction or Beyond the Sun (with the typographical errors on Serials E and Z tidied up). The same listing went on to make cameo appearances in both Doctor Who - The Unfolding Text in November 1983 and also Jeremy's own Doctor Who - The Early Years in May 1986.

DOCTOR WHO - 20TH ANNIVERSARY SPECIAL

Hot on the heels of Haining came another very nice tribute magazine from those awfully nice Radio Times people who had hired major fan and major record producer Ian Levine (who was also aiding producer John Nathan-Turner with all matters of continuity at the time) to write a piece entitled Doctor Who - a 20-year voyage through eternity which would name check everything up to the then-unmade The Twin Dilemma. Ian's piece began with An Unearthly Child, The Daleks, The Edge of Destruction and then stuck to the generally accepted titles, using the Making of variant The Dalek Master Plan for Serial V.

Late 1983 also saw the DWAS starting to issue Plotlines for Season 3. The first of these, Galaxy 4, was issued with a cover which included titles such as The Dalek Master Plan (again from Making) and interestingly The Space Ark (which David Howe recalls he used as somebody had claimed to have seen a can of film thus marked at the BBC film library - this was after all close to what appeared in Radio Times and, to my mind, on the RNID release). This batch were plagued with problems, with only Galaxy 4, Dalek Cutaway - Mission to the Unknown, The Massacre and The Ark (not The Space Ark) released by 1986.

Target were also getting their act together over novelising the earlier stories over this period, and the generally accepted titles were again being used: The Aztecs (May 1984), Marco Polo (December 1984), The Myth Makers (April 1985), The Gunfighters (July 1985), Galaxy Four (October 1985), The Celestial Toymaker (June 1986), The Space Museum (January 1987), The Sensorites (February 1987), The Reign of Terror (March 1987), The Romans (April 1987) and The Massacre (June 1987). September 1986 saw the publication of The Doctor Who File, the third outing into Whodom by Mr Haining. At the rear of this book was a list of where all the adventures were set entitled The TARDIS Log; this adhered generally to Jean-Marc's listing, with Serial A as An Unearthly Child, Serial C as Edge of Destruction and Serial P as The Crusaders.

ENCYCLOPEDIA OF THE WORLDS OF DOCTOR WHO: A-D

David Saunders embarked upon this ambitious - and sadly still-to-be-completed - glossary of Whoish terms for Piccadilly Press, and the first volume, published in November 1987, included a title index. This too stuck close to JML's 1981 set of titles, but adopted The Tribe of Gum for Serial A with an (aka An Unearthly Child), followed Haining & Bentham for Serial B (The Daleks (aka The Dead Planet)) with Serial C sticking to The Edge of Destruction. Serial V was given as The Dalek Master Plan - in accordance with The Making of Doctor Who.

W.H. Allen and Target were also still churning out the goods: The Rescue in August 1987, The Time Meddler in October 1987 and The Edge of Destruction in May 1988. January 1988 saw the first of Titan's Doctor Who: The Scripts, this debut release being Serial A under the title of The Tribe of Gum. In this, John McElroy also refers to the title 100,000 Years BC / 100,000 BC and indicates that it is unlikely that An Unearthly Child was ever a title for the whole serial. Haining wrung the last drops of goodness out of the subject with Doctor Who - 25 Glorious Years in September 1988 which offered a section entitled Time Travels. This again was almost an exact duplication of Jeremy's notes of five years earlier, although Serial A was simply An Unearthly Child, Serial B purely The Daleks and Serial C merely The Edge of Destruction.

Now, a fairly important article published in November 1988 within the pages of The Frame Issue 8 was The Origins of Who in which Stephen James Walker had done a lot of digging about the formative months of the series - and was now stating that the first serial The Tribe of Gum became Dr Who and a 100,000 BC, that the first Dalek story had the working title of Dr Who and the Mutants and that the third was Dr Who inside the Spaceship. Yes, Steve had been lucky enough to find a copy of the Friday 1 November 1963 amendment document. By now though, fandom had been through a lot of chopping and changing on some of these titles - and to be honest while two of these three new names didn't actually sound that good, the third offered a distinct clash with a much-despised Jon Pertwee serial (which has actually always been one of my favourites). This piece indirectly led to Steve's wonderful and ground breaking What's in a Name? which appeared in Issue 16 of The Frame in November 1990. In this, Steve was brave enough to tackle the subject of what we could define the 'correct' title for the first time, citing precisely documents which he had seen (notably the Friday 1 November document) and also taking in the details on camera scripts (which he had researched at the late lamented BBC script unit) and some of the BBC Enterprises documentation. Names such as Dalek Cutaway and The Massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve were now being put forward. This was a superb work, and still worth reading to this day.

W.H. Allen and Target delivered some more firmly titled adaptations with The Edge of Destruction in May 1988, The Chase in July 1989 and The Daleks' Master Plan spanning two volumes in September/October 1989 ... with Planet of Giants bringing up the rear in January 1990. In the meantime BBC Video had been busy getting their monochrome releases under way with The Daleks (guess they didn't read The Frame) in June 1989, An Unearthly Child (guess they definitely didn't read The Frame) in February 1990, The Dalek Invasion of Earth in May 1990 and The Web Planet in September 1990 (with an associated re-titled Target reissue of Mr Strutton's novel). Of course, seeing as how these are being issued by dear old Auntie itself - it is a reasonable assumption to make that the Voice of Authority has spoken. As if to back them up, the Titan Script Book for Serial B was also issued as The Daleks in December 1989 - although to Mr McElroy's credit there was a full explanation of the alternative The Mutants title on Page 15.

DOCTOR WHO - THE PROGRAMME GUIDE

With the series pretty firmly dead, the time was ripe for Jean-Marc to update his Programme Guide once and for all - and the December 1989 revision adopted some of the new thinking on titles in noted asides. Serial A was still An Unearthly Child with the index adding (aka The Tribe of Gum). Serial B was still The Daleks, but the entry concluded with a footnote explaining about the problem with the real title, The Mutants. Serial C remained The Edge of Destruction but the index also offered (aka Inside the Spaceship or Beyond the Sun) - with no indication any more that Beyond the Sun was incorrect. Serial V became The Daleks' Masterplan in this edition. This listing also appeared in Jean-Marc's two companion volumes with minor changes. 1991's Doctor Who - The Terrestrial Index adopted it less the notes on B and C. 1992's Doctor Who - The Universal Databank had the list without the note on Serial B, with Beyond the Sun as the only aka for Serial C and Serial V christened The Daleks Masterplan sans apostrophe.

DOCTOR WHO AUDIENCE DATA

Now, here's a funny thing ladies and gentlemen. In 1990, the BBC Broadcasting Research department decided to do a quick assessment on the impact of Doctor Who on ratings and with the audience, and had one Samantha Beere compile a document entitled Doctor Who Audience Data based on the BBC Audience Barometers and the PasBs. Admittedly the report has its shortcomings (omitting The Five Doctors and having Colin Baker take over in Warriors of the Deep just for starters!), but it does also use serial titles for all the stories. And God only knows where she got these from. Since she retains The Lion Heart for Serial P, you'd imagine that she's had access to Stinfos or Tardis - which seems unlikely. But then if she'd been using these, where does she get The Daleks from for Serial B? Serial A is given as The Tribe of Gum, Serial C as The Edge of Destruction - Okay, you can get those from several sources. But she's also the kosher BBC Dalek Cutaway for T/A - presumably off the PasB. Serial V is The Dalek Master Plan ... but the one where you suddenly stop is Serial X: The Space Ark. What has she been reading? The RNID synopses? The DWAS Plotline cover? What???

June 1991 offered some more 'definitive' titling from BBC Video when episodes of The Crusade and The Celestial Toymaker popped up on The Hartnell Years. A year later, the two survivors from The Dalek Master Plan made their way onto Daleks - The Early Years in July 1992 - and in September 1992, Carole Ann Ford recorded links for the ultimately unissued The Reign of Terror. The Aztecs was also issued in November 1992.

DOCTOR WHO - THE SIXTIES

Then we get what is still a truly breathtaking book - the first major publication from the triumvirate of David J Howe, Stephen James Walker and Mark Stammers. Doctor Who - The Sixties changed a lot of perceptions of the developing decade when it hit the shops in October 1992. With this work - and the studies undertaken by Marcus Hearn for DWM in 1993/4 - all of a sudden established and accepted facts were being challenged, re-discovered and re-written more then ever before. H-S-W went their own way on titling, putting into effect the earlier research and theories of Steve Walker with 100,000 BC for Serial A, The Mutants (usually referred to as The Daleks and explained as such) for Serial B, Inside the Spaceship for Serial C, the introduction of the numeral version of Galaxy 4 from the camera script and for Serial W The Massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve. There was also a comment on how Mission to the Unknown was also known as Dalek Cutaway. This series of titles was refined by the team for The Handbook: The First Doctor in November 1994 - Serial B was given as The Mutants and Serial DC as Dalek Cutaway. By this time, Marvel's DWM had adopted the new titles as a standard set. Further videotape issues from the Beeb over this period were The Chase in September 1993, with The Rescue/The Romans in September 1994.

David Brunt of the DWAS Reference Department had relaunched the Plotlines format as the Index Files with The Dæmons in 1993 - later Index Files concentrated on obscure or non-existent serials such as The Daleks' Master Plan (January 1994), Inside the Spaceship (February 1995), Marco Polo (April 1995), The Celestial Toymaker (April 1996) and The Crusade (October 1996) - adopting the H-S-W titles where necessary.

DOCTOR WHO - PROGRAMME GUIDE

With the latest revision of his volume, Jean-Marc found that he was under no obligation to use the 'rediscovered' titles from The Sixties - indeed, in a shrewd move by Peter Darvill-Evans, Virgin factual book writers have always been allowed to use whatever set of titles they personally hold as being either the right ones or the most well known ones. This time around, JML retained the titles from his previous volume, but noting (aka The Tribe of Gum and working title 100,000 BC) in the index for Serial A, retaining his footnote on The Mutants for Serial B, and also noting the working title of Inside the Spaceship for Serial C (Beyond the Sun seemed to have fallen by the wayside at this point). However, he retained Mission to the Unknown and The Massacre while he had upgraded to The Daleks' Master Plan in The Universal Databank. This edition was published in June 1994.

Titan issued the script book for Galaxy 4 in July 1994, followed by The Crusade in November. In his early 1995 book The Doctors - 30 Years of Time Travel, Adrian Rigelsford was happy to adopt the Howe-Stammers-Walker titles for Serials A, B, C and W but retained Mission to the Unknown over and above Dalek Cutaway for T/A; his version of T was Galaxy Four.

THE DISCONTINUITY GUIDE

In a bold move, the authors of this May 1995 work decided on a back-to- basics approach... and to have some fun. Tackling the, by-then, controversial topic of The Title Problem head on, Paul Cornell, Martin Day and Keith Topping stated in their Introduction that "The only canonical titles are those that appear on screen. We remain that the proper title should remain what the story is known as by most people ... 'An Unearthly Child' is the democratically elected title for the first story, reflected by the BBC in their video releases. Calling it anything else might be a mark of strict accuracy, but it could also be a sign of elitism". As a result of this, the debut serials reverted to being An Unearthly Child, The Daleks and The Edge of Destruction. Serials T/A and W remained as Mission to the Unknown and The Massacre. As such, the entire work was in line with JML's contemporary fourth edition - and also showed what an impact the second 1981 edition must have had on the bulk of Doctor Who fandom in its formative years.

Lance Parkin's Doctor Who - A History of the Universe in May 1996 adopts the H-S-W titles too apart from referring to Serial B as The Daleks for the sake of clarity. December 1996 saw a wonderful slant on the whole issue from Chris Howarth and Steve Lyons in their hilarious Doctor Who - The Completely Useless Encyclopedia: The Obligatory Doctor Who Episode Guide considers 100,000 BC and The Tribe of Gum for Serial A before crossing them out in favour of An Unearthly Child. Serial B passes through The Mutants and The Dead Planet before being The Daleks. Serial C ends up at The Edge of Destruction via Beyond the Sun and Inside the Spaceship ... and after altering Journey to Cathay to Marco Polo the authors quite rightly declare "Oh, sod this for a game of soldiers ..." and get on with the book.

In September 1997, Doctor Who - The Book of Lists from Justin Richards and Andrew Martin had an appendix on The Stories which also follows H-S-W while noting that Serial B is The Mutants aka The Daleks.

So - here we are almost 20000 words later. What have we learnt? Well - hopefully that it's a complete mess and that as long as we all know what we're talking about - who cares? The one in Tombstone 1881 is still one of the funniest serials of all - be it The Gunfighters, The Gunslingers or The Wild West. Last week I was again amazed at the first Dalek serial - regardless of it being Beyond the Sun, The Mutants, The Survivors, The Dead Planet, The Daleks or anything else. And I still find The Sensorites incredibly tedious - maybe a title change could liven it up.

I am reminded of two things which very dear friends and colleagues of mine have said to me on this subject. Dr Martin Wiggins, eminent academic and all round genius, commented in his learned tones, "The issue, dear boy, is really one of whether fandom perceives itself as being more important than the programme it is appreciating, and hence able to ascribe its own preferences over and above the documented historical facts". Kevin Davies, short, fat, hairy TV director immediately bubbled into a frantic French and Saunders routine with "But ... but Jennifer! It's all so trivial!!"

If all the above has helped in any way to confuse the issue still further, provoke outraged debate with associated fist-fights in bars at conventions and raises more questions than it answers, then I consider my efforts to have been well worthwhile.

My thanks to the following people for help and inspiration on this piece and its research: J. Jeremy Bentham, David Brunt, Kevin Davies, David Gibbes-Auger, David J Howe, Richard Molesworth, Jan Vincent-Rudzki, Stephen James Walker, Martin Wiggins.

So, just bringing this sad and sorry state of affairs up to date around a decade later ...

First of all, the combined facts of around 16 years off the air and developments in technology means that we can now have all of Doctor Who's history cluttering up our living room shelves to watch or listen to whenever we want on all manner of formats from BBC Enterprises who begat BBC Worldwide who begat 2|entertain. And these sensible people have generally used consistent titling for their products which usually adheres to the most commonly accepted titles. As such, we have:

1. An Unearthly Child (VHS: 1990/VHS: 2001/DVD: 2006 in The Beginning), with versions of the pilot episode also on The Hartnell Years (VHS: 1991) and The Edge of Destruction (VHS: 2000)
2. The Daleks (VHS: 1989 on two volumes, The Dead Planet and The Expedition/VHS: 2001 as The Daleks [remastered]/DVD: 2006 in The Beginning)
3. The Edge of Destruction (VHS: 2000/DVD: DVD: 2006 in The Beginning)
4. Marco Polo (CD: 2003)
5. The Keys of Marinus (VHS: 1999)
6. The Aztecs (VHS: 1992/DVD: 2002)
7. The Sensorites (VHS: 2002 as part of The First Doctor)
8. The Reign of Terror (VHS: 2003/CD: 2006)
9. Planet of Giants (VHS: 2002)
10. The Dalek Invasion of Earth (VHS: 1990/DVD: 2003)
11. The Rescue (VHS: 1994)
12. The Romans (VHS: 1994)
13. The Web Planet (VHS: 1990)
14. The Crusade (VHS: 1999/CD: 2005) with a brace of episodes on The Hartnell Years (VHS: 1991) and Lost in Time (DVD: 2004).
15. The Space Museum (VHS: 1999)
16. The Chase (VHS: 1993 as part of The Daleks boxed set)
17. The Time Meddler (VHS: 2002 as part of The First Doctor)
18. Galaxy 4 (CD: 2000)
19. Mission to the Unknown (CD: 2001 as part of The Daleks' Master Plan)
20. The Myth Makers (CD: 2001)
21. First of all, two episodes of The Dalek Master Plan on Daleks - The Early Years (VHS: 1992) after which the favoured title became The Daleks' Master Plan (CD: 2001) also used on Lost in Time (DVD: 2004)
22. The Massacre (CD/Cassette: 1999 although the disc/tapes are marked The Massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve which is also how the sleeve notes refer to it)
23. The Ark (VHS: 1998/CD: 2006)
24. The Celestial Toymaker (CD: 2001) with the final instalment on The Hartnell Years (VHS: 1991) and The Lost Years (DVD: 2004)
25. The Gunfighters (VHS: 2002 as part of The First Doctor/CD: 2007)

Oh, and don't forget that rather nifty - if not at all easy to listen to - 2003 CD release entitled Doctor Who: Devils' Planets - The Music of Tristram Cary from BBC Music which also referred to serials B and V as The Daleks and The Daleks' Master Plan.

From the above, you can see that generally the title situation is - as since the 1970s - pretty stable, apart from some debate over serials A, B, C and W with occasion variations on serials P, T, T/A and V. The continuing interest in the show's history has ensured a steady flow of reference and study books during the last decade, kicking off with Doctor Who: The Television Companion by David J Howe and Stephen James Walker. First appearing from BBC Books in 1998, this was regarded as having some 'official' (oh - I hate that word) status at the time, although its subsequent revised appearance from the author's own company, Telos, in 2003 has by necessity had to have 'unofficial and unauthorised' caveats stamped all over it. Anyway, in line with their earlier works, the authors' choices for the pesky serials listed above were 100,000 BC (also known as An Unearthly Child), The Mutants (also known as The Daleks), Inside the Spaceship (also known as The Edge of Destruction and Beyond the Sun), The Crusade, Galaxy 4, Mission to the Unknown (also known as Dalek Cutaway), The Daleks' Master Plan and The Massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve (also known as The Massacre). Now, the use of the phrase "also known as" here is a very wise one. Take Serial C for example. These are two authors who, above everyone else on the planet, know that there is no evidence at all for Beyond the Sun being applied to Serial C since it was actually a title for Serial B. But they are also sensible enough to recognise that this notion has engrained itself in fan culture for over twenty years, no matter how little it is based in fact.

1999 gave us both The Nine Lives of Doctor Who by Peter Haining and John Kenneth Muir's pricey guide A Critical History of Doctor Who on Television from US academic publishers McFarland. Having been out of the Doctor Who scene for a while, Peter Haining's episode listing included the following titles and alternatives which indicated that he'd been aware of recent research: An Unearthly Child/100,000BC (aka The Tribe of Gum), The Daleks (aka The Mutants), Inside the Spaceship (aka Edge of Destruction/Beyond the Sun), The Crusade, Galaxy Four, Mission to the Unknown (aka Dalek Cutaway), The Daleks' Master Plan and The Massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve. And, for a bonus, he also gave us Serial D as Mar