Christian Cawley's Blog, page 132

Big Finish Listeners’ Club Gets Major Deal on Return of the Rocket Men!

Nick Kitchen is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

A critique that often gets leveled at Big a Finish throughout the corners of the Interwebs is that the audio adventures simply cost too much. I think, however, that it’s not really an issue with the price tag that would be listeners have but an issue with perceived cost of entry. After all, there are tons of Big Finish Doctor Who adventures out there and the notion can be overwhelming to those of us who are completists. If you find yourself in that boat or are just looking for a good starting point, Big Finish’s Listeners’ Club might be the answer for you and this month is offering a great place to start leading up to March’s Fourth Doctor release.

This month sees Doctor Who – The Companion Chronicles: Return of the Rocket Men at a fantastic discounted price of £2.99. We reviewed the audio back in 2013, if you want to know what your fellow Kasterborites thought of the adventure. Here’s an idea of what to expect with the audio:

“Once before the Doctor battled the sadistic Rocket Men and once before he won. But when the dreaded pirates of the skies raid a remote frontier planet, he’s not the only member of the TARDIS crew for whom they are old enemies. Steven Taylor knows them well. Back in his days as a pilot, on his twenty first birthday, Steven’s ship was brought down by the malevolent Van Cleef. He barely escaped with his life. And now he’s going to have to go through that again. But this time round, he knows what happens. And he knows there’s no way out. Steven Taylor has to make a choice. A choice where either way… he loses.”

Now, we mentioned that this deal would make a good entry point for new listeners; here’s why. March will see the release of Doctor Who – The Fourth Doctor Adventures: Requiem for the Rocket Men, a brand new full cast audio that will see the Fourth Doctor, Leela, and K-9 take on the pirates again:

“The Asteroid – notorious hideaway of the piratical Rocket Men. Hewn out of rock, surrounded by force-fields and hidden in the depths of the Fairhead Cluster, their base is undetectable, unescapable and impregnable. In need of allies, the Master has arranged to meet with Shandar, King of the Rocket Men. But the mercenaries have captured themselves a very special prisoner – his oldest enemy, the Doctor. What cunning scheme is the Doctor planning? How does it connect with Shandar’s new robotic pet? And just what has happened to Leela? The Master will have to work the answers out if he wants to leave the asteroid… alive…”

To recap, that’s Tom Baker, Leela and K-9, the Master, and the Rocket Men all in one not to be missed package. It’s certainly an exciting time to get involved if you’re on the fence. The discounted Doctor Who – The Companion Chronicles: Return of the Rocket Men can be purchased for download here and he forthcoming Doctor Who – The Fourth Doctor Adventures: Requiem for the Rocket Men is up for preorder now.

Are you interested in the Listeners’ Club selection this month? Are you looking forward to the Fourth Doctor taking on the Master and the Rocket Men? Let us know below!

The post Big Finish Listeners’ Club Gets Major Deal on Return of the Rocket Men! appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

Karen Gillan Recalls Life with Matt & Arthur on Doctor Who

Andrew Reynolds is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Fans gathered at February’s Wizard World comic con were treated to an exhaustive Q&A session with former Doctor Who companion and Guardians of the Galaxy irritant Karen Gillan; covering everything from Matt Smiths pranks to leaving the show behind and her thoughts on the new man, Peter Capaldi.

It’s clear from behind the scenes footage that during Gillan’s time aboard the TARDIS, the three leads had a certain chemistry together, which just happened to sometimes involve attacking each other with a shoehorn.

“So Matt and Arthur would torment me. I don’t have any brothers, but I now know what it feels like to have brothers. They were just relentless,” she said. “Every day they would just swarm into work later than me and be like, OK, what can we do to make her cry now?

“Matt took to doing this thing where he would hide in my trailer and jump out at me when I would go in…There was this huge shoehorn in my trailer for some reason, I don’t know why, I don’t use shoehorns, but it was there. So he hid in the corner and he jumped out and started screaming really aggressively with this shoehorn in his hand. I backed up against the wall and did that dramatic slide down the wall to the floor, like crying/laughing. That was embarrassing because it was a dramatic reaction.”

Taking the torment in her stride, Gillan went on to praise the work of her Doctor; calling him ‘one of the most exciting actors I’ve ever worked with’ and one of her best friends – which made the moments leading up to her departure from the show all the more difficult: “It was like someone really died in my life,” she said.

“I was like grieving over this character. I was so sad about it, actually, that I refused to read the script until I really, really had to, and it came to shooting it. I remember Matt and Arthur being like, ‘Will you read this script so we can talk about this?’ And I was like, ‘Nope, not happening.’ And just severe denial, all the stages of grief, I went through. And it was just really, really sad.

“It sort of became not like acting anymore when we were doing the scenes, because it felt like something was ending and it was really sad for all of us, actually…

“I remember the last thing we shot was in the episode The Power of Three,” she added. “It was just like a normal shot of us looking outwards, outside the TARDIS, and we had to one-by-one go inside the TARDIS. So it became this really symbolic moment where Arthur went in, I went in and then Matt went in, and they shouted “cut” for the very last time. And we all just like hugged in the dark in the TARDIS. It was like such a beautiful moment, actually.”

When it came to returning to the TARDIS for her brief, poignant cameo during The Time of the Doctor, Gillan was on hand to see the moment where her Doctor became the man of the moment, Peter Capaldi – it was a change that, at first, she found difficult to accept: “I really like Capaldi, I have to say. It was hard for me to accept a new man, but I was like, he’s really doing it,” she said.

“It’s a new direction for the character and I really like the relationship between Jenna and Capaldi. I think they work really well together, and I like that he makes fun of the English accents. I wasn’t shocked he became the new Doctor because I knew that he was the biggest Doctor Who fan ever, so it made me really happy he got the role, “she added.

“But I was there. I had a weird experience because I went back for Matt’s regeneration scene, and then Capaldi was coming into shoot his first scenes, so Matt left the studio, and then the door opened again and it was all dark again and light on the outside. And then this silhouette appeared in the door and I was like, “It’s him!” And then he just started striding in with the jacket and it was Capaldi. It was like one in, one out, like in the space of about 10 minutes. It was a really odd, amazing moment.”

You can imagine, as Gillan prepares for the sequel to Guardians of the Galaxy , there’ll be more “odd, amazing moments” to come – not to mention once again shaving her now ponytail length hair for the role of intergalactic blue bad ass, Nebula: “I’m so excited that ‘Guardians II’ is going to be happening and I’m going to be involved in some way,” she said.

“But you know, I have a physical and emotional attachment to this hair. To be honest, I don’t know, but I will say that wigs are really fun, so that shouldn’t be ruled back. I’ll probably make another wig out of my hair. I don’t know, we’ll have to see if I have to shave it. Maybe CGI will have developed further by the time we shoot it.”

Other than future hair erasing technology, what other developments in the evolution of Nebula would Gillan like to see?

“Maybe it would be fun to learn a little bit more as to why she turned out that way,” she said. “It was cut from ‘Guardians,’ but there’s a scene between Nebula and Gamora where they talk about their upbringing and their training for battle and their modifications. That kind of explains her motivations for being such a meanie, and I really like that. So more of that would be good.”

You can read a full breakdown of the Q&A over at The Herald Bulletin or alternatively, you can watch the whole thing unfold her thanks to the fan shot-video (by Jane Delworth), above.

The post Karen Gillan Recalls Life with Matt & Arthur on Doctor Who appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

Is This the “Average” Face of the Master?

Philip Bates is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Prepared to be a little bit freaked out!

Dave Clipson, whose name was officially crowned the Perfect Name For YouTube late last year, has morphed together the faces of the Masters – the in-canon ones anyway. He starts with Roger Delgado, adds in some Anthony Ainley, has a bucket full of Eric Roberts, a dash of Derek Jacobi, swirls in some John Simm, then tops it off with Michelle Gomez hundreds-and-thousands. In addition, he burns the mixture with the so-called “Crispy Masters” aka Geoffrey Beevers’ and Peter Pratt’s incarnations from The Deadly Assassin, and The Keeper of Traken.

Clipson then used WinMorph and Photoshop to find the average faces of the Master. The results are funny and more than a little unsettling. And thanks to the Masters from NuWho, the “Average” face is sans beard. Instead, there’s a five o’clock shadow, or as I call it: A Sign of Things To Grow.

In an odd sort of way, the video is quite hypnotising. Seems appropriate, don’t you think?

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The PodKast Live: Doctor Who Props & Fan Stuff

Christian Cawley is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

In a pleasant change from the usual podKast format, Christian Cawley and Brian A. Terranova broadcast this week’s show live on Google Hangouts. We appreciate it was short notice, and so you may have missed it, but worry not – you can watch the ensuing, freeform discussion (topped off with some recommendations). It certainly made a nice change to have the pressure of a live show (albeit for one live viewer!) and we hope you enjoy it as much as we did.

We’ll have the audio version for Audioboom, Sitcher and iTunes along a little later, but until then, click play above to watch Christian and Brian discuss props, Faye Marsay, Doctor Who story formats and even Dapol figures…

The post The PodKast Live: Doctor Who Props & Fan Stuff appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

Crime Lord: Doing Time (and Space)

Nick May is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Doctor Who’s relationship with crime and criminals is a long and interesting one. The series’ central trope of good versus evil takes on an added dimension when that evil has a more base motivation than ruling the world. The genres of crime fiction and sci-fi have come up through the ranks together, both rising to prominence in the nineteenth century through the works of Wilkie Collins and HG Wells respectively, so it was inevitable they would converge at some point.

A recent re-watching of Series 8’s Time Heist revealed the story to be more interesting than on first viewing, not so much for the adventure itself which, though superficial, rattled along nicely, but in spotting the influences and deconstructing the episode. Madame Karabraxos is usurious, vain and ultimately trapped by her situation, having created, almost literally, a gilded cage for herself in the heart of the bank. Her motivations are somewhat contrived: why not just contact the Doctor to get her out of the bank? In fact, why not just leave?

The episode owes more than a little to recent crime films and TV. The device of amnesiac protagonists has cropped up in Danny Boyle’s Trance (itself a remake of a 2001 film with Neil Pearson) and Christopher Nolan’s Memento. Visually, Time Heist takes its style from series like Hustle, all slow-mo sashaying through glossy buildings, which in turn ripped off the aesthetics of films like Lock, Stock and Steven Soderbergh’s remake of Ocean’s Eleven.

Indeed, it was ever thus. The series’ portrayals of nefarious activity move with the times in which they were produced. When Robert Holmes created chancers like The Ribos Operation’s Garron and Trial of a Time Lord’s Glitz, the viewing public was sitting down to the exploits of loveable rogues like Arthur Daley in Minder and Porridge’s Norman Stanley Fletcher. We are asked to find them endearing for all their avaricious intent, to like them despite their motivations.

Rewind a few years more, back to The Seeds of Doom, and the treatment is a lot less rosy, akin to the violent goings-on in series like The Sweeney. It’s no coincidence: director Douglas Camfield had only recently directed one of The Sweeney’s more infamous episodes, Thou Shalt Not Kill, which wears its politics on its sleeve regarding the arming of the police. Back further still, we come to The Ambassadors of Death and Regan (no relation), a sharp-suited ne’er-do-well in the mould of gangsters in films like Get Carter or (pun intended) the criminally overlooked Villain and Robbery.

The series’ most obvious brush with the criminal classes is The Mind of Evil, set as it is in a prison. It’s the Pertwee era’s last hurrah for gritty storytelling, with the Mind Parasite playing second fiddle to the machinations of Mailer, menacingly played by crime drama regular William Marlowe, and his gang, a group so volatile that even the Master has trouble keeping them in check. Like Douglas Camfield on Seeds, director Timothy Coombe makes The Mind of Evil a hard-hitting crime drama with a sci-fi edge. The battle for Stangmoor Prison and the cliffhanger to Episode Five (“I only need one of you…”) is atypically realistic for the time, with not a ‘hai!’ in sight.

The caper is another staple of the crime genre. Differentiated from the heist story by its lighter tone (Reservoir Dogs and The Town are heist movies, The Jokers and The Italian Job are capers), capers feature elaborate crimes committed by stylish people swapping witty one-liners in glamorous locations. City of Death, with its Parisian setting and art thefts, is the series’ caper movie. Film stars Julian Glover and Catherine Schell provide the style and glamour, the Mona Lisa provides the ultimate prize and Douglas Adams provides all the memorable lines. Shada would see him attempt the same thing with the theft of alien books in Cambridge, though Skagra, with his disco Windy Miller costume, definitely lacks the panache of the Scarlionis.

Organised crime has reared its ugly head in the series on occasion, and seldom have those heads been uglier than those of the Slitheen in Aliens of London or the Foamasi in The Leisure Hive. Both are crime families in the vein of the Mafia-‘Foamasi’ is even an anagram of ‘Mafiosa’. Toward the end of The Leisure Hive, the West Lodge crime family are caught by the Foamasi ambassador, just in time for the Doctor to help smooth things over with the Argolin. Sadly, neither really cut the mustard as crime families, with the Slitheen’s continuous fart gags in particular undermining their gangster credentials.

City of Death, with its Parisian setting and art thefts, is Doctor Who’s caper movie.

It would be interesting if we could see more of The Smugglers and its portrayal of 17th century law breaking. What’s left is a collection of the robbing and the stabbing and the looting and the shooting (to quote The Paragons) that was the lot of the average booze-peddling malcontent on the Lizard Peninsula. Some of the violence on show seems to be in excess of the story’s Robert Louis Stevenson-lite reputation, almost akin to the infamous acid-throwing scene that got ITV’s Big Breadwinner Hog taken off air around the same time. There was a lot of ruffle-wearing in that, too.

The perpetrator in Poe’s The Murders in the Rue Morgue was an orang utan. The Avengers started with heroin smuggling and ended with Steed and Tara being launched into space. The criminal and the fantastic have long gone hand in hand, just as greed and avarice have driven individuals and groups to break the law to achieve their aims. As abhorrent as that behaviour is, it makes for a good story. The fantastic elements of sci-fi allow writers to take the trusted staples of the crime genre and to ramp them up (selling a planet, robbing banks with alien ambassadors) to amazing proportions.

Not to do so would be, well…

The post Crime Lord: Doing Time (and Space) appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

Faye Marsay: “No Talk” of a Shona Return

Christian Cawley is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Well this is very interesting. Actress Faye Marsay, who endeared herself to a big chunk of Doctor Who fandom during Last Christmas, has claimed that there has been no talk of Shona McCulloch returning to the show.

Marsay – previously known for The White Queen – was praised for her honest portrayal of a potential companion following hints and claims that Jenna Coleman might be leaving the show in the ultimate-sounding Christmas adventure.

Speaking to Den of Geek about the DVD release of E4 sries Glue, Marsay was quizzed about her brief time on Doctor Who and if we’ve seen the last of Shona. She replied: “With Shona, there’s been no talk of her returning.” Which is interesting as it puts to bed some rumours that have been circulating since her appearance. Also, Marsay doesn’t say that she won’t be returning, just that Shona won’t…

When asked if she would like to return, Faye is enthusiastic.

“Definitely! I loved working with the people. They’re wonderful to work with and incredibly talented. And Peter Capaldi! God, I fancy him so much. He’s amazing! The people, the production and the crew are the nicest people. And again, being really sycophantic, it’s a really nice set up they have in Cardiff, and really good people who care about the show. I would definitely go back and do more Doctor Who. Whether they’d have me back, I don’t know! No-one’s rung, so I’ve got to let it go and be thankful I was in it in the first place!”

We also hear from the actress herself that she reprised the “Shona Shuffle” in her home town on Boxing Day.

What do you think? Would you like to have seen Faye Marsay return with Shona?

The post Faye Marsay: “No Talk” of a Shona Return appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

WATCH: The Making of The Doctor Who Experience

Christian Cawley is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Ever wondered how the Doctor Who Experience’s new footage starring Peter Capaldi in a variety of TARDIS console rooms was made? Yes you have, don’t be silly.

In the video above, see director Paul Wilmshurst (Mummy on the Orient Express), designer Michael Bennet and writer Joseph Lidster talking about the development and production of these scenes, and watch as Peter Capaldi himself works with some behind the scenes footage.

There’s nothing mindblowing here, however, but if you’re planning a trip to the Doctor Who Experience then this might just prove a useful taster for your upcoming adventure…

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Newly-Released Kate O’Mara Interview

Philip Bates is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Here’s a lovely treat: the late, great Kate O’Mara spoke about her time in Doctor Who in a video recently released by the BBC.

O’Mara of course played the Rani in two serials, Mark of the Rani, and Time and the Rani, the latter of which never garnered much praise but Kate was nonetheless excellent opposite the new Seventh Doctor, Sylvester McCoy. In that story, she’s probably most famous for two things: i) dressing up like Bonnie Langford; and ii) that line, “leave the girl – it’s the man I want.”

In the above video she’s asked where and when in time and space she’d go in the TARDIS, how Doctor Who has lasted so long, and if she’s a fan of anything else. The most affecting part, however, is that she would’ve liked to have returned as the Time Lady. This interview was conducted at the Doctor Who Celebration, an event revolving around the 50th Anniversary of the show, shortly before her passing in March 2014.

The post Newly-Released Kate O’Mara Interview appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

Fan Series Doctor Who: The Soldier Stories Coming Soon

Barry Rice is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

“A Doctor saves…A Master controls…A Soldier Serves.”

That’s the tagline for a bold new fan production called Doctor Who: The Soldier Stories. The first episode recently premiered at Dallas Comic Con and will be released online March 26th.

The Soldier Stories focuses on a Gallifreyan special forces operative called the Soldier, who fought alongside the Doctor in the Great Time War. Together with his new companion Emily, a war veteran herself, the series plans to explore the effects of battle on the human (and Time Lord) psyche.

If that all sounds a bit dark for Doctor Who, you’re right. The Soldier Stories takes place on the grittier side of the Whoneverse, creeping into the dark underworld where the Doctor rarely ventures. The trailer for the pilot episode, Only Orders, strongly evokes the feel of that OTHER Doctor Who spin-off, Torchwood (and that’s not a bad thing):

The pilot is already completed, but the production team is currently looking for donations to film an entire season’s worth of episodes. They have several perks available in exchange for donations on FundAnything (which is almost exactly like Kickstarter except, well, it’s not called Kickstarter). You can claim anything from a tweet from the crew to an autographed poster, or even dinner with the Soldier. The goal is $65,000, with any remaining funds going to a charity favorited by one of the Doctors.

Notice that goal amount is in American dollars, not pounds sterling. That’s right, this is an American production, filmed in Oklahoma of all places. Ballyhoo Creative Group and Take One Productions, the two companies behind The Soldier Stories, are based in Tulsa and Oklahoma City, respectively. (Full disclosure: I, too, live in Tulsa, which is how I became aware of this production, but I am not involved in any way — yet. Call me, maybe?) Despite the location, the producers say they are striving to create a show that true to its source material and are hopeful that fans on both sides of the pond will enjoy the result.

Actors Cory Philips and Jami Harris fill the lead roles of the Soldier and Emily, with voice actor J. Michael Tatum (Attack on Titan, Lupin the Third) as the villainous Dr. Davis. If the fundraising goal is met, they have several minor genre actors lined up for appearances, from shows like The Walking Dead and The Guild.

For more on Doctor Who: The Soldier Stories, check out the teaser trailer above, visit their fundraising page, or follow them on Facebook and Twitter.

What do you think? Are you eager to see more adventures of the Soldier?

The post Fan Series Doctor Who: The Soldier Stories Coming Soon appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

Did You Know These People Are Also Whovians?

Rebecca Crockett is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

When I started watching Doctor Who, I only knew a handful of people who were part of the fandom, and most of them were those I’d met at comic conventions. So it was much to my surprise to find that amongst all of my friends in other fandoms, that there were more than a few Whovians! Some of them were people I’d known for years! If you’re like me, when you find out someone else is a fan, you have this moment where you want to do nothing but talk Who with them, no matter what else it is that you were supposed to be doing. It’s like you’ve made an instant connection with someone, and that little piece of the world where ever you are just got a little bigger because you share a fandom!

Now while we don’t always think about it, celebrities really are just normal people that happen to have a job in life that puts them in the spotlight. They go the same kinds of places we go, sleep, eat, breathe, and live just like you or I. And the have their own likes and dislikes, even if their job has made them part of what   a fandom obsesses over. So is it any wonder that there are Whovians among the celeb crowd too?

Florence Welch, Florence and the Machine

Welch is a new Whovian. She really hadn’t watched it much before but when Matt Smith became the Doctor, she was hooked. Reports are that Smith even hoped she’d make a guest appearance on the show, but that never occurred during his tenure. Doesn’t mean it still can’t happen!

Rick Riordan

Riordan, most known for the YA series Percy Jackson and the Olympians is among the famous Whovian writers of the world. He’s mention the Daleks in one of the books of his Kane Chronicles and mentioned the show itself in his most recent book, The Blood Of Olympus, the last book in his Heroes of Olympus series, the sequel series to Percy Jackson. Hey, Mr. Moffat, fancy a Greek or Roman mythology based story? How about asking Riordan to write for the show?!

Mike Tyson

Yes, that Mike Tyson, the boxer with the penchant for ear nibbling and facial tattoos. Seems that he, too, is a fan of the Doctor, though he thinks the Doctor is older, not some young man like Matt Smith. He apparently told Smith as much to his face when they met at a convention. Check out the interview with Matt at Comic Con last year where he mentions it. (Smith’s interview starts around the 4:22 mark)

Rob Lowe

The current DIRECTV pitchman, Lowe once told the Metro newspaper that he was a Doctor Who fan, back in 2005. They quote Lowe as saying, “I love the show, and did not realise they were remaking it. I’d even play a Dalek.” Even a Dalek? I personally think Lowe would be an interesting Master…

Scott Bakula

Bakula is no stranger to sci-fi, with his two most notable roles being in Quantum Leap and Star Trek: Enterprise. So it’s not really much of a surprise that he’s a fan of the longest running sci-fi show of all time. So much that he was even offered a part on the show. When casting for the series 7.1 episode A Town Called Mercy, the role of the sheriff was offered to Bakula. Unfortunately he wasn’t able to accept, so the role went to Ben Browder, from Farscape and Stargate: SG1. “They were filming in Spain, and it didn’t work out timing-wise, because my daughter was getting married, so I just couldn’t go. I’m fascinated by the whole idea of the character being bigger than the ideas, that blows my mind, and I think it’s great. I watched a lot of it when I was on stage in the UK, and I realised that this is a show I could get behind.” Sam Beckett meets the Doctor? Can this actually happen? Please?

Pink Floyd

Now this might be common knowledge to some, but I was unaware that the band were fans of the show. (Does explain the PF/DW graphic mashups though) But given their style of music, which has influences of the work from the BBC’s Radiophonic Workshop, I should have known! The band even went so far as to sample the theme tune in one of their songs, One Of These Days, and are said to be a favorite of the Doctor himself. Did you catch the tune he briefly whistled in The Caretaker? (Hint: It’s a wildly popular song by the band, one that even those who aren’t fans know.) The band recently released a mostly instrumental album in honor of their late keyboardist that includes two songs both titled Allons-y. They aren’t really tributes to the show, but that name is sure to spark any Who fan.

David Duchovny

So playing an alien investigator wasn’t enough? When David Tennant ended his tenure as the Doctor, speculation was of  course rife with suggestions of who should be the next Doctor, which ultimately turned out to be Matt Smith. Duchovny was among those suggested to replace Tennant. He, however, wasn’t interested, even though he was a fan of the show. “I love Doctor Who and I remember the first one, which was wonderful in its low-tech quality,” he told the Daily Star at the time, in 2008. “‘I also loved the theme song, which sounded like The Cure to me.” He joked that he might play a foe of the Doctor. “Who’s the bad guy? The Dalek? OK, I’ll play him.”

Slipknot

In the wild rumor category, back when the show was prepping to relaunch, some people believed that the Beeb would tap the mask wearing metal heads of Slipknot to record the show’s opening theme. Their sound isn’t what one normally thinks of when one hears that familiar tune but it turns out the band is among the fandom. At the time, drummer Joey Jordison told Blabbermouth that the band would be thrilled to have such an honor. “I’m so excited Doctor Who‘s coming back. It’s a great show, wild and exciting. I watched it as a kid and it freaked me out. I’m 29 now and it was only a couple of years ago that I figured out what was going on. It’s weird timing that Who’s coming back after so long because Prelude 3.0 [on their record Vol. 3 (The Subliminal Verses)] is based on the theme. It’s our way of saying this album’s going to take you on a wild, messed-up journey.” Interesting. Maybe their sound might be one that would match Capaldi’s new darker Doctor?

Iron Maiden

Another British musical institution, the band Iron Maiden are also fans of the good  Doctor. On the album sleeve for their record Somewhere In Time, the TARDIS can be seen, as well as in the artwork for the song Wasted Years off the album. Now, given the album is about journeys in time, it’s not surprising to see the image of the TARDIS included in all of the sci-fi references. But turns out that at least one member of the band, vocalist Bruce Dickinson, is a fan of the show. “I always watched Jukebox Jury because it was on before Doctor Who, on a Saturday night. So Jukebox Jury and Doctor Who became inseparable in my mind. The excitement of seeing The Beatles or whoever on Jukebox Jury was kind of similar to the excitement I would get out of seeing the Cybermen on Doctor Who. They were both from a different world to me.”

Reports are that he even owns a Dalek!

(Incidentally, the great Bruce Dickinson is currently undergoing treatment for cancer. Kasterborous would like to wish him the very best, speedy recovery.)

The original list I compiled while writing this article had 100+ names on it. I’m fairly certain that even such a long list barely scratched the surface of all the famous fans of the Doctor that there have been and will be. It’s amazing to see how far such a show has reached in it’s influence across the globe, in many parts of life. Doctor Who is not just a pop culture phenomenon, it’s a permanent part of society. Are there any other famous folk out there that you know are part of our Whovian fandom, aside from the oft mentioned likes of Peter Jackson, Johnny Depp, and Queen Elizabeth?

The post Did You Know These People Are Also Whovians? appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.