Time Crash

This year, I have posted comment on all the Doctor Who episodes shown. Yesterday evening saw a new adventure, Time Crash, filling a gap towards the end of Utopia/The Sound of Drums/Last Of The Time Lords.

OK, it was only a 5-minute thing, as part of the Children In Need night. This was the fourth time that there has been a Doctor Who event as part of Children In Need. The first was in 1983, with The Five Doctors marking the 20th anniversary of Doctor Who, with Patrick Troughton (2nd Doctor) and Jon Pertwee (3rd Doctor) joining then then-Doctor, Peter Davison. William Hartnell (1st Doctor) had passed away by then (his last work was joining Troughton and Pertwee for the 10th anniversary adventure The Three Doctors), and so the first Doctor was played by Richard Hurdnall, and Tom Baker (4th Doctor) did not take part, so footage from Shada, a partly-recorded (and therefore never shown) adventure, was worked into the story.

The second time was in 1993, with the excruciatingly embarrassing Dimensions In Time.

Then, in 2005, a short sketch marked the gap between Bad Wolf/Parting of the Ways and The Christmas Invasion. This was untitled, but Russell Davies, the producer, jokes that it could be called Pudsey Cutaway (Pudsey is the teddy bear that is Children In Need's mascot, and there are fans who argue that Season 3's Mission To The Unknown in 1965 should really be called Dalek Cutaway).

Davies had initially said that there would be no multi-Doctor adventures, but this rule is broken as Davison returns.

The pre-credit scene shows Martha leaving to be with her family. As the TARDIS leaves, an alarm sounds and the Doctor rushes to the console and runs into.... himself.

Basically, the TARDIS has collided with itself and the fifth and tenth Doctors have to sort out the problem.

It won't go down as a classic, but just pleasant to see Davison return to his old role, and to very much parody the technobabble of his era.

The programme returns on Christmas Day with Voyage Of The Damned.

Next spring, Season 30 starts. From what I have read:

• there is a one-part adventure where the Doctor is reunited with Donna, from 2006's Christmas adventure, The Runaway Bride.
• then a one-part adventure.
• then a one-part, Planet of the Ood, seeing the return of the slaves from Season 28's The Impossible Planet/The Satan Pit.
• then a two-part adventure seeing the return of Martha, and the Sontarans.
• then a one-part adventure. I note that Martha isn't listed for this one. As she is in 5 episodes this season, I expect that she returns for the last 3 (either a one-part followed by a two-part, or a three-part adventure).