RIP Trevor Baxter

After the excitement of the announcement on Sunday that Jodie Whittaker will play the 13th incarnation of the Doctor, comes a sad day for us Doctor Who fans as it was announced that Trevor Baxter has died, aged 84.

Baxter has a special place in the heart of fandom thanks to his appearance in the classic 1977 Robert Holmes penned serial The Talons of Weng-Chiang, a Fourth Doctor story set in Victorian London that is widely regarded as one of the finest stories ever to be made in Doctor Who's history. Alongside regulars Tom Baker and Louise Jameson (Leela), Baxter played Professor George Litefoot essentially playing Dr Watson to the Doctor's Holmes and forming an enjoyable double act with Christopher Benjamin's theatrical MC, Henry Gordon Jago. So endearing was this double act that the Who production team considered giving them their own spin-off series, but the plans initially came to naught. In the intervening years, the popularity of the characters increased in fandom leading them to make many appearances in Doctor Who novelisations before Baxter and Benjamin were at last asked to reprise their roles in a series of audio adventures from Big Finish. This led to them finally getting their own series, Jago & Litefoot, since 2009. 

Away from Doctor Who, Baxter was a prolific performer on stage, TV and film. A member of the RSC, he toured the Bard with Sir Ralph Richardson across South America and also wrote a number of plays himself, including Ripping Them Off. He also adapted Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray and Lord Arthur Saville's Crime for the stage in 2003 and 2005 respectively, and the latter was revived with Lee Mead in the lead role in 2010.

His TV credits include appearances in Adam Adamant Lives!, Maelstrom, The New Avengers, Thriller, The Barchester Chronicles, Jack the Ripper and Doctors, whilst his films include Nutcracker, Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow and Van Wilder: The Rise of Taj.

RIP

RIP Geoffrey Bayldon

The great Geoffrey Bayldon has sadly died at the age of 93.

An actor of far too many credits to mention, the Leeds born Bayldon held a special resonance for fans of cult, sci-fi and fantasy drama and anyone of a certain age now thanks to his most famous role, the eccentric medieval wizard Catweazle, from the 1970s series of the same name, who found himself transported to the present day.

Born in 1923, Bayldon served in the RAF during the war and trained to be an architect in peace time. However, a change of heart saw him take up study at the Old Vic with an ambition to become an actor, an ambition that was soon met; Bayldon was pretty much a regular face on British television from the 1950s onwards. He was considered for the lead role in Doctor Who not once, but twice; first in 1963 when the programme was commissioned and again in 1966 when the original lead William Hartnell stepped down. On each occasion, Bayldon said thanks but no thanks, but eventually took a guest role in the 1979 story The Creature from the Pit as the astrologer Organon opposite Tom Baker and Lalla Ward. In more recent years, he relented enough to play an alternate reality version of the Doctor in two Big Finish audio adventures; Auld Mortality and A Storm of Angels. Other famous roles include the sinister Crowman opposite Third Doctor Jon Pertwee in Worzel Gummidge, the title role in 1995's Magic Granddad and as Weston, the cynical teacher in the film To Sir, With Love.

RIP

Blake's 7 Set To Return

Yup, the big news among sci fi fans and lovers of vintage tele is that a remake of Blake's 7, Terry Nation's classic sci fi serial of rebels against The Federation is to be remade for the SyFy Channel

Remake News

I must confess I was never a major fan (preferring Nation's contributions to Doctor Who, The Persuaders! etc and now of course Survivors) but I did watch a lot of it on UK Gold in the 90s and some I really liked, whereas others...well even hardcore fans would agree with me there! But the concept is still so utterly fresh and has something to say, to the point that it's just weird this remake hasn't happened sooner (though there have been many audio adventure remakes care of Big Finish with a frankly brilliant cast and the hilarious spoof Blake's Junction 7, which I've previously blogged about/uploaded on here) I'm really looking forward to the remake and a chance to revisit classic eps thanks to my friend Kate, a massive fan, who has promised to send me some!

Love And War

Bernice Summerfield! The first witty, feisty attractive female archaeologist...yes there was one long before River Song! Love and War was a Doctor Who novel from 1992, one of The New Adventures series that kept the flame alive following the series cancellation in 1989 until 1997, following its brief return to TV and the subsequent franchise takeover at BBC Books.

Bernice 'Benny' Summerfield became something of a fan favourite and a character in her own right in several spin off novels and audio adventures from the Big Finish company where she is played by Lisa Bowerman (who played Sandra Mute in the first two series of Casualty)  Indeed it has just been announced that Big Finish have adapted Benny's debut Love And War as a full cast audio adventure available from October with Sylvester McCoy, Sophie Aldred and Bowerman. 

I was a teenager when the New Adventures came out. Some, in the earlier years were a bit too strong for me, with their graphic depictions of violence, sex and swearing and their adult approaches to big social issues (in Doctor Who?!) but the older I got as the series progressed I came to grow with them and appreciate them more. Sure some were silly, a bit too keen to appear 'grown up' and in doing so were actually terribly immature (several book covers featured paintings of actors like Aldred, familiar from the TV show, in a completely unfamiliar heavily pneumatic shape reducing them little more to wank fantasies) But overall now, I view them with great fondness as prime examples of 1990s teen/young adult fiction and believe that in many ways with their aforementioned mix of mature themes, social conscious and sci fi they were the precursor to Torchwood. This news from Big Finish has made me yearn to restart my collection care of Ebay! Doh!