Very sad today to hear of the death of Verity Lambert at the age of 71. Verity was the very first producer of Doctor Who when it first aired exactly 44 years ago today.

She was the first female BBC producer and the youngest – a year younger than I am now – when she took charge of steering such a ground-breaking drama serial through its first years. Many of the elements that featured in that first episode are present in the series today, so it’s no understatement to say that without her we probably wouldn’t have the hugely successful show we still have today.

Alex has written a lovely blog post already, and Russell The Davies’s tribute is worth repeating:

“There are a hundred people in Cardiff working on Doctor Who and millions of viewers, in particular many children, who love the programme that Verity helped create.

“This is her legacy and we will never forget that.”

As it’s Doctor Who’s birthday, I was due to head to the pub anyway to celebrate with The Fans. Tonight, we’ll be toasting Verity.

There are a few years between them. They each have different styles of presentation. Neither of them has any policies on the economy as far as I’m aware. Erm…

As I’m not allowed to comment on the biggest subject currently enveloping the Liberal Democrat blogosphere, I’ll have to appeal to the Doctor Who blogosphere instead. [Obligatory plug: if you’re a Lib Dem supporter, click here to join the party before the end of the month and get a vote in the leadership election.]

This year’s Children in Need is on November 16th and once again there’s a special Doctor Who scene. This one is called “Time Crash” and is written by Hugo Award winner (twice) Steven Moffat. And it features David Tennant and the return of Peter Davison as the Fifth Doctor. Which, if you’re a Doctor Who fan, is pretty exciting.

Here’s the story on the official site.

A novel way to get young people to church is being tried out with a special service at St Paul’s in (Lib Dem) Grangetown, Cardiff. The church was used as a location for Paul Cornell‘s Doctor Who episode Father’s Day a few year’s ago, and the series is its means to entice fans in, as icWales reports:

Fr Dean Atkins, youth officer with the Diocese of Llandaff and one of the organisers of the service, said: “The figure of Doctor Who is somebody who comes to save the world, almost a Messiah figure.

“In the series there are lots of references to salvation and the doctor being almost immortal. We are using the figure of Doctor Who as a parable of Christ.

“The language used in the series lends itself to exploring the Christian faith.”
[…]
Parish priest Fr Ben Andrews said: “I love the series, and it has such a great following that we couldn’t resist doing something for young people on a Doctor Who theme.

Full story here. I hope you appreciate my restraint in titling this post, when Rise of the Congregation, The Sound of Hymns, Army of Holy Ghosts or Pew Earth were all out there.

The BBC have announced that there will be a fifth series of Doctor Who – but not until 2010. After next year’s series, 2009 will see three one-off* episodes starring David Tennant. No words on whether he’ll be back after those.

The full story is on the BBC News site.

*Technically not one-offs if there are three of them, of course.