2020 has seen Doctor Who fans and professionals come together to lift each other’s spirits like never before. Now the original fiction created during lockdown is being collected together in aid of Children in Need
If the world can agree on one thing it’s surely this – 2020 has been a strange, strange year. Full of unprecedented challenges and difficulties, it’s tested us all. Normally, with events like the global pandemic, we’d expect to wait a few decades to see the Doctor Who stories it inspired. (Blogtor doesn’t doubt future generations will sit down to watch the Twenty-Fifth Doctor battling an alien menace in 2020). But with fans of all ages never needing the positive message and inspiration of Doctor Who like never before, fans and professionals alike rose to the challenge like never before. And now new collection Adventures in Lockdown celebrates that while benefiting Children in Need.
The official Doctor Who website played host to brand new short stories from Doctor Who’s top talent. Jodie Whittaker recorded special messages in character as the Doctor, with the revelation that she keeps a copy of her costume at home as adorable as the optimistic videos themselves. Emily Cook of Doctor Who Magazine organized a whole series of special lockdown watchalongs. And each was accompanied by special extras, such as new prose fiction, animations or live action minisodes starring the Doctor Who cast of various eras.
All three of Doctor Who’s modern showrunners contribute stories to the collection
Some of these quarantine stories are now being collected together in prose and script form for the very first time. Doctor Who: Adventures in Lockdown will be out on the 5th of November in aid of Children in Need. Highlights include Russell T Davies’ long lost 50th Anniversary story Doctor Who and the Time War, The Secret of Novice Hame, and Revenge of the Nestene, his new epilogue to Rose. His successor Steven Moffat also returns with a new poem based on Listen, and The Terror of the Umpty Ums. A love letter to the power of Doctor Who, Umpty Ums sees a child who may be more that he seems receives a visitation from a Doctor who may be more than she seems. While current showrunner Chris Chibnall inserts a new short story between Twice Upon a Time and The Woman Who Fell to Earth with Things She Thought While Falling.
The Thirteenth Doctor and her gang star in a number of the other tales too, including Paul Cornell’s loose trilogy. These variously feature featuring the Fam in lockdown on an alien planet, Bernice Summerfield, and the return of the Family of Blood. Graham just wants to go see a football match in The Simple Things by Joy Wilkinson. And the Doctor stumbles across a long forgotten recording by her granddaughter Susan in Pete McTighe’s Press Play.
The collection also includes previously unseen stories from Neil Gaiman, Mark Gatiss and Vinay Patel
Bestselling author Neil Gaiman returns to Doctor Who with two new tales. Rory’s Story is a message all the way from Rory Williams in 1940s New York, while One Virtue, and a Thousand Crimes, written exclusively for this collection, is an untold adventure for the Corsair. Other brand new stories for Doctor Who: Adventures in Lockdown include The Tourist by Vinay Patel, and Fellow Traveller by Mark Gatiss. Alongside the stories will be new art from a whole host of fan favourite artists, including Lee Binding, Sophie Cowdrey and Chris Riddell.
Full list of stories
- A Message from the Doctor
- Things She Thought While Falling by Chris Chibnall
- The Terror of the Umpty Ums by Steven Moffat
- Doctor Who and the Time War by Russell T Davies
- Revenge of the Nestene by Russell T Davies
- Rory’s Story by Neil Gaiman
- One Virtue, and a Thousand Crimes by Neil Gaiman
- The Simple Things by Joy Wilkinson
- The Tourist by Vinay Patel
- Fellow Traveller by Mark Gatiss
- The Shadow Passes by Paul Cornell
- Shadow of a Doubt by Paul Cornell
- The Shadow in the Mirror by Paul Cornell
- Press Play by Pete McTighe
- Listen by Steven Moffat
- The Secret of Novice Hame by Russell T Davies
And there is also new work by illustrators:
- Lee Binding
- Mike Collins
- Sophie Cowdrey
- Sonia Leong
- Valentina Mozzo
- Chris Riddell
- Adrian Salmon
- David Wardle
- Richard Wells
£2.25 from every copy sold in the UK of Doctor Who: Adventures in Lockdown will benefit Children in Need (registered charity number 802052 in England & Wales and SC039557 in Scotland). You can pre-order the collection now from all good UK book retailers, and it will be published on the 5th of November. RRP £8.99
