Doctor Who: Watchers in the Fourth Dimension

SILENCE!! while we dive into yet another story touching on our dislike for colonialism, but engaging us, however briefly, in our appreciation for fever dreams. That’s right, dear listeners, we’re discussing Kinda this week and hopefully you all have remembered that sleeping near windchimes by yourself can have dire consequences, such as snake tattoos and lipstick teeth.   Join us as we discuss Teg...

This episode, we tackle a story that has been in the bottom quartile in both DWM’s Mighty 200 and 50th Anniversary polls – it’s Four to Doomsday! But, what will the Watchers think? This one goes probably as well as you’d expect…   Join us as we discuss how this story is built like a Hartnell story, Adric turning into an incel, what the guts of the androids are made from, how Monarch is the most af...

This episode, we finally get ourselves started on the Fifth Doctor era as the Master returns (again) to taunt our new Doctor in Castrovalva… heh heh heh…   Join us as we discuss just how young Peter Davison was when this was made, whether or not Adric was a little TOO excited at being tied up in the Master’s web (or if it’s just the harness), Tegan’s need for “enormous thrust,” Bidmead’s myriad we...

This episode, we discuss Doctor Who’s very first attempt at a spin-off with the rather questionable K9 and Company: A Girl’s Best Friend! It was certainly a wild ride watching this one, with plenty of witches and honking along the way…   Join us as we discuss THAT theme tune, whether K9 and Sarah Jane are actually a good pairing, whether K9 is put to good use, Brendan being put in a dress, how Sim...

As we’ve finally made it to the end of the Tom Baker era (a feat that has taken us close to two-and-a-half years!), we are once again joined by the 5th Watcher, R. Alan Siler, who guides us through our era-spanning retrospective for the longest-running (and arguably most popular) Doctor of all time!   Join us as we discuss the best stories to sum up each Producer during the era, whether RTD and Mo...

Another season in the can! Season 18 done and dusted, and you know what that means… it’s time for our customary season retrospective, in which we take a look back at the entirety of the season with our blend of awards, metrics, and questions from our friends on social media. These are always a lot of fun for us to do, and we really hope that you enjoy listening to this as much as we did recording...

It’s the end, but the moment has been prepared for… (were we ever going to start out this blurb with anything else!?) We finally reach the end of Tom Baker’s seven year tenure on the show with the Master embarking on a bonkers scheme that threatens the entire universe. But one question remains – is Logopolis actually any good!?   Join us as we discuss dressing for job that you want, why Tegan is m...

Back in N-Space, we find ourselves in the very odd (but apparently extremely harmonious) society of Traken, ruled over by an apparently all-powerful Keeper in The Keeper of Traken! All is not as it seems, as an old, kinda crispy enemy lurks in the background, ready to steal all of our bodies in his quest to keep living…   Join us as we discuss the clear influences of Shakespeare, how the Trakenite...

It’s time to BRING THE WEIRD as we wrap up the E-Space trilogy with a white void, slavers, lion-man slaves (who used to be slavers), magic mirrors, and more questions than answers. Oh, and Adric spends most of the time flipping coins. It can only be Warriors’ Gate!   Join us as we discuss how the Tharils look at time (or how they think they’re better than everyone else), how K9 continues to be don...

It’s Doctor Who-does-Vampires as we encounter everyone’s favourite bloodsuckers in E-Space (well, everyone except Diana, who apparently thoroughly dislikes vampires!) Throw in some absolutely unnecessary Time Lord lore, and we have State of Decay.   Join us as we discuss whether this would feel more natural with Dudley Simpson’s organic music over the synth, the merits and issues of Adric, whether...

For our 2024 Holiday special, Julie’s taking over the show, and we’re joined by our favourite regular guest R. Alan Siler, as choose not do something seasonal, but to do something very much related to Doctor Who that we’ve really wanted to do for a while now… and so, we’re heading into the world of Douglas Adams, as we discuss the 1981 TV version of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy!   Join us...

We’re off into E-Space this episode, as we encounter a group of people who’ve come full circle in… uh… Full Circle! We are also introduced to our newest companion, Adric. What will the Watchers think of him!? Will it be love at first sight? (Let’s be honest… probably not. Everyone knows his reputation!)   Join us as we discuss unexpected semi-nudity (butts!), the mathematical nature of the Starlin...

Moving further into this brave new era of Doctor Who, Jacqueline Hill returns in nobody’s favourite story, Meglos! In addition to Barbara-but-not-actually-Barbara showing up, we also get a genocidal cactus. It’s an absolutely bonkers one, that's for sure…   Join us as we discuss balancing out your gut bacteria (lest you suffer from chronic hysteresis!), the colour-coding of society and how it impa...

It’s all change as we kick off Season 18 with The Leisure Hive! New title sequence, new arrangement of the theme, new incidental music, and a new costume for the Doctor! Meanwhile, we welcome our new co-host Diana for her first regular episode with us. We couldn’t be more excited to talk about nuclear war and tachyonics…   Join us as we discuss how awful this story makes Brighton Beach look, the c...

Anthony, Reilly, and Julie bring some exciting news about the future of the podcast!

We’re at the end of Season 17, and could we really get there without a Big Finish bonus episode!? This time around, we’re talking about The Romance of Crime, which was adapted from a Virgin New Adventures novel by RTD/Moffatt-era writer (and now cancelled) Gareth Roberts, and adapted by Big Finish legend John Dorney!   Join us as we discuss horrendous squish sounds, the conversion of the novel to...

Another season in the can, bringing the 1970s era of the show to a close. Of course, that means that it’s time for our customary season retrospective, where we’ll look back at the entirety of Season 17 with our usual blend of end-of-season awards, a look back at our scores and metric counts, and answer a few questions from our friends on our social media platforms. These are always a lot of fun to...

Welcome, once again, to our annual house of horror! As usual, we discuss two horror movies featuring the stars of television’s Doctor Who. This year, we kick off proceedings with Hammer Films’ The Vampire Lovers (featuring Ingrid Pitt, Peter Cushing, and Kate O’Mara), before moving on to Amicus Production’s first anthology film, Dr Terror’s House of Horrors (featuring Peter Cushing, Roy Castle, an...

While The Horns of Nimon was officially the end of Season 17, efforts have been made over the years to complete the unfinished story that was meant to be the season finale – Shada. And we are discussing the “definitive” version of that story that released on the 2021 Blu Ray release, mixing live action with animation in an episodic format. Given that the production team had hoped that this story w...

It’s time for us to discuss what was unexpectedly the season finale of Season 17. The last contributions to the show of Graham Williams, Douglas Adams, Dudley Simpson, and Anthony Read. It also has the reputation of being one of the worst Doctor Who stories of all time. It’s The Horns of Nimon. But will the Watchers find it to be as absolutely terrible as fandom would have it?   Join us as we disc...

We’re tackling the war on drugs in a delightfully zany story by one half of the Bristol Boys – Nightmare of Eden! This one is filled with so many ideas that it can only be a Bob Baker script – spaceship crashes, insurance conversations, conservation efforts, and needlessly complex drug running schemes. While Season 17 may not quite be at the heights of Season 14 (the pinnacle, so far!), it sure is...

In this episode of the podcast, we demonstrate what utter masochists we are by subjecting ourselves to the absolute mess that is The Creature from the Pit. Oh boy. We’re just going to say it up front. We hated it. There you go. That’s the potted review, right here in the blurb. But to hear just how frustrated and annoyed we get at this story, go ahead and listen to the podcast episode. We promise...

We’re off to Paris (don’t you think it has a bouquet?) for what is held up by many as the outstanding adventure of Season 17 – City of Death! Will we find it as endearing as the majority of fandom seems to (8th in DWM’s Mighty 200 poll and 5th in the 50th anniversary poll, don’tcha know)? Well, you’ll have to listen in to find out!   Join us as we discuss the clear step-up in both SFX and model wo...

It’s a full house, as we are joined by both Alan Siler and Diana Birney to discuss the recent animation of The Celestial Toymaker. Will it be the best animation yet, or nothing more than psychedelic nightmare fuel?   Join us as we discuss the pros and cons of the controversial animation style, whether Dodo is the worst companion of all time, the racist under/overtones of the story, possible other...

New Romana, who dis? It’s the return of everyone’s favourite hack writer, Terry Nation, as we kick off Season 17 with Destiny of the Daleks! We get multiple quarries, a ton of NationTropes™, a bunch of Douglas Adams-inserted humour, and some robots that are also icons of D-I-S-C-O!   Join us as we discuss the totally unexplained regeneration of Romana, the untapped potential of the Daleks as quiz...