2016

Editor's note:
During 2016 I took a year off from the forums. The content of this post is only what I was able to find upon my return to the forums and playing a little bit of catch up. There may well have been more rumours discussed throughout the year.

2016

January 2016

22 – The Radio Times announces that Steven Moffat will step down after series 10 of Doctor Who, to be replaced by the writer of The Hungry Earth/Cold War and The Power of Three, and creator of TV series Broadchurch, Chris Chibnall. 

However, series 10 will air in 2017, with only a Christmas special to air in 2016.

October 2016

2 - On MEF, a now-deleted member with handle thelost106, posts snippets from an Amazon review of the official animated Power of the Daleks release. The reviewer named "Paz" claims to have seen Power when he was 11: his school principal supposedly showed the story to students at the time. Paz says this happened "40 years ago". (See also October 5.)

5 - Regarding the lead on Power in Singapore, member Dave Crichton offers to investgate. (The investigation is later taken up by member A Barron: see March 1, 2021.)

16 – On GB, Nth Doctor quotes someone on the FB ME group who reportedly posted that an individual who previously worked on the Doctor Who DVD special features told him that two episodes of The Wheel in Space have been found.

18 – Ian Levine takes part in a Q&A session on the DWME Group’s YouTube channel.

November 2016

10 – On MEF, member Lou Singh makes some extraordinary claims about seeing missing Doctor Who material that are worth quoting in their entirety:

“As I have said before: "The Traitors" - from Kirksen grabbing Katarina through to the two bodies floating in space; "The Power of the Daleks", episode 1 - from the opening titles through to the Doctor playing his jig on the recorder.

I am one of several eyewitnesses to one 40-something BNF attempting up a 23 year old woman at a con with the temptation of seeing the missing episodes he brought with him to the con.  He and his cronies twice tried to pick up other people I know very well (one was 21 at the time; the other was 13 [thirteen]).  I had warned them about this ruse.  These women they both said that his friends who tried to pick them up had claimed to have over half the missing episodes at the time in their possession and had seen more.  (That would have been 66/132, for those who want to know when this was.)

The then-21 year old is now a Republican political operative and businesswoman in the Pittsburgh area.  The then-13 year old has since joined the USAF and has done 2 tours in Iraq and 2 more in Afghanistan.  As friends of mine for 30 years, I trust them without question.  Indeed, the former 13 year old compared Trump to these clods last month when I told her about the animation of The Power of the Daleks.

Make fun of me all you want.  I know that it has been tried at least three times.  Just because it sounds ridiculous to you doesn't mean it didn't happen.

That's aside from the other unsubstantiated claims I know about with "The Myth Makers", "The Savages", "The Highlanders", and "The Wheel in Space".”

December 2016

25 – On GB, a poster called evil johnny claims that the same source who told him about Power animation and the return of Enemy and Web in 2013 has now told him that two missing episodes are “back”. He is ignored for two days!

26 – Fantom Films publish an interview with Philip Morris. In this fascinating piece, Morris says that the search for missing episodes is not straight forward; things that people think happened, didn’t. Morris says he tries to look at things from multiple angles, speaks to multiple persons and to create a 3D view of problems. Furthermore, he is confident of finding “anything” that is missing.

Morris reiterates that Web 3 was stolen by a bribed employee of the TV station where he found Enemy and Web. However, he says he is now getting close to resolving this issue.

He also states that Sierra Leone held no Doctor Who episodes when its archive building was destroyed. The episodes were all returned to London, however he does not know if anything was destroyed or otherwise.

He also answers Toby Hadoke’s question – that if there are any more Doctor Who episodes to be returned and released to the public, he will not say one way or the other, because he wants them to be a surprise. Anything that happens he will make sure it comes completely out of left field. He ends with a reassurance that he will leave no stone unturned in the search for missing TV.

28 – In a later post, evil johnny states that his contact gave him the heads up on Enemy/Web in July 2013. (Although this is possibly contradicted by a post on MEF in which it is claimed the post was from September. But, see 29 December 2016.) He then says that his contact belives that it’s “2 Hartnells” that are back, with the rest of the story being animated. 

This could make it Marco Polo, The Myth Makers, The Daleks’ Master Plan (which would now have 5 episodes), Galaxy 4, The Massacre, The Savages, The Smugglers or The Tenth Planet.

28 – On GB, Richard Smith makes a fascinating post about one earlier by PV, which is that he said that The Web of Fear arrived in the UK before December 2011, and Enemy shortly after that. He points out that PM’s claim that he found Enemy/Web (never seen this?) in late 2011 is questionable.

29 – In response to a query, evil johnny posts on GB the full text of his post from 4 September 2013:

Hi everyone,

For your information:

I've heard from a very reputable source (someone well-known in fandom - not a writer) that Web and Enemy are being worked on. No mention of Marco though. Obviously, I can't tell you who this is.

I tried to confirm this with another source who admitted he'd signed an NDA and couldn't talk about it.

For what it's worth...