DOCTOR WHO: FROM A - Z

Take a new look at Doctor Who. He's a secretive and aggressive old man hiding in a London junkyard. He's a jolly human inventor who takes his grandchildren on thrilling adventures. He's an outcast from the all-powerful Time Lords of Gallifrey. He's the unpredictable scientific adviser to a United Nations military force. He's just an overgrown kid who eats jelly babies, plays cricket and regularly saves the universe.

He's all these things and more. He's the Doctor. And in his world, everything is possible.

He's appeared on TV, film, stage, in novels and on CD-ROM. He's been a comic book hero and a 3D soap star. His adventures have been screened everywhere from Australia to Zambia. The name of his deadliest enemy has earned a place in the dictionary as a byword for ruthless tyranny. A whole generation can hum his theme tune.

It's 35 years since the fantasy adventure series Doctor Who made its under-budgeted and largely unheralded debut on BBC Television. In that time it has been in and out of favour, alternately respected and reviled, triumphed and trashed; but it survived to earn a place as one of the best-loved and longest-running television series in the world.

Lavishly illustrated with previously unseen photographs, this witty and eclectic collection of commentaries takes a fresh look at Doctor Who from a host of different perspectives, and forms an easy-to-read but nonetheless indispensable guide to what can only be described as a television phenomenon.

GARY GILLATT is editor of Marvel Comics' Doctor Who Magazine. He is 26 and lives in south London.

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