Who's On Children In Need?

If you're craving your fix of new Dr Who exploits now it's been over three months since series four ended, you'll doubtless be pleased - and, maybe, a bit surprised - to hear that the BBC have just announced that the first two minutes of the forthcoming sixty-minute Dr Who Christmas Special 'The Next Doctor', which guest stars David Tennant's old Blackpool sparring partner David Morrissey and Ballykissangel star Dervla Kirwan, during its jumbo Friday night charity telethon Children in Need next month.

Dr Who has traditionally had very strong links to the Children in Need appeal (although I won't mention 1993's 'Dimensions In Time' if you won't) especially since the series reappeared in 2005. A specialcharity 'Galactic Dinner' black tie event was held in 2005 in a top Cardiff hotel with then new Doctor David Tennant and his companion Billie Piper appearing in person and in 2006 the Millennium Centre in Cardiff was host to a wonderful gala concert of Murray Gold's extraordinary musical compositions for the show (this was the event, by the way, at which it really and finally struck home to me how popular Dr Who had suddenly become and how ridiculously broad its appeal was) whilst in 2007 fifth Doctor Peter Davison returned to the TARDIS in a brief and charming special sequence writeen by new showrunner Stephen Moffat. With Dr Who currently out of production until January it appears there's been no time to put together something special for this year's Children in Need (despite hilarious recent press reports that a special episode featuring 'all tne incarnations of the Doctor' was on the cards!) so this mouth-watering (undoubtedly) clip from the next broadcast episode will be premiered exclusively during the telethon.

How many TV shows could do this? How many Tv shows could broadcast two minutes of footage six weeks beforew broadcast and find the fact it's happening worthy of a Press release all its own? Crazy, crazy days indeed for old-time Dr Who fans like me. Whilst it may be a bit of a shame there's nothing a bit more substantial on the cards this year, I'm already counting the days until Children in Need...

Check out the link in the post-title above to read the BBC press release...