20 Cancelled Doctor Who Episodes You Need To Know About

A few years into the Wilderness Years, it became clear that Doctor Who was going to be off air for its 30th anniversary.

To plug the gap, the BBC commissioned a feature-length, direct-to-video special, written by Adrian Riglesford and titled Lost in the Dark Dimension.

Set in a world where the Fourth Doctor survived his fatal fall in Logopolis, and thus never regenerated into his successors, it would have starred Tom Baker as an older Doctor, alongside, the Brigadier, “Dorothy” (an alternate version of Ace) and the Brigadier’s son/Ace’s boyfriend Alex.

The other surviving Doctors would have featured in minor roles, with the Daleks, Cybermen, Ice Warriors and Yeti also returning. Rik Mayall was being eyed up for the ultimate big bad, Hawkspur (a professor/politician possessed by a deadly alien entity).

The special was formally announced in June 1993, with Graeme Harper lined up to direct. However, by July it had been canned, owing to an insufficient budget, complaints from the Doctor actors about not having bigger roles, and the ongoing negotiations with Philip Segal that led to the TV Movie.

In the event, the BBC instead celebrated Doctor Who’s 30th birthday with the much-loved documentary 30 Years in the TARDIS and not-so-loved Children in Need special Dimensions in Time.