Back in the seventies, in order to clear out space in their archives, the BBC cleared out a lot of their old recordings, including a significant number of episodes of Doctor Who. Of course with the advent of the home video recorder, and subsequently the DVD player in the eighties and beyond, the BBC are now making a lot of money by selling old Doctor Who stories to fans, but of course with some episodes missing, that leaves them with a problem. Currently there are 108 missing episodes. Although there are pictures from all the episodes, and off air recordings of the soundtrack, many of which have been packaged up for the fans, it’s not the same as having an actual episode.

As a result, the BBC have recently announced a new advance, in November they are to release the Invasion – the story that brought us the iconic images of the Cybermen on the steps of St Pauls. Rather than having linking material as with the video release, the BBC have contracted Cosgrove Hall, previously responsible for the animated adventure Scream of the Shalka, to reconstruct the missing episodes as animation. The BBC are hosting a tempting 30 second trailer – certainly it will be interesting to see quite how the story comes out, and whether it will be a viable option for recreating the remaining missing episodes, as close to their original form as possible.