"The Dalek's Master Plan" Episodes to Join Classic 'Doctor Who' Lineup
The BBC is only 35 episodes away from restoring every classic 'Doctor Who' serial in some form.
Easter 2026 will be a little more out of this world as the BBC announces two lost episodes of Doctor Who have been found, newly restored, and will premiere in time for the holiday. The long-running serial is famous for having many of its earliest episodes recorded over, a relic of an era when television was seen as an ephemeral medium, with shows broadcast once and never again. The latest finds are the first and third episodes of the First Doctor serial “The Dalek’s Master Plan,” “The Nightmare Begins,” and “Devil’s Planet,” originally aired in 1965. They were recently unearthed in an old cardboard box once belonging to a deceased collector.
After being turned over to the BBC for restoration, the 16mm telecine recordings of the two black-and-white episodes will now be available to stream for the first time.
Technically, 95 episodes in all are considered “lost,” with no video recordings having been recovered. However, the audio for all 95 episodes is currently housed in the BBC archives, mainly thanks to hardcore fans who recorded audio tapes from their televisions when the episodes initially aired. Those audio recordings, along with storyboards, telesnaps, and other still images, have enabled most of the “lost” episodes to be recreated in some form, with the visuals primarily reconstructed through animation.
While some serials remain completely lost, with zero visual media to work with, piecemeal finds of episodes like these have enabled the BBC to reconstruct the vast majority. With the arrival of the two newly restored episodes on the iPlayer, only 35 episodes remain completely unavailable; most of them are from the five serials that are wholly missing: Season 1’s “Marco Polo,” Season 3’s “The Myth Makers” and “The Massacre of St Bartholomew’s Eve,” and Season 4’s “The Smugglers” and “The Highlanders.”
With the addition of “The Nightmare Begins” and “Devil’s Planet” from “The Daleks’ Master Plan,” the Season 3 serial now has 5 of its 12 episodes found. It is now in a prime position to have the other seven restored via animation.
All episodes of “The Daleks’ Master Plan” were written by the man credited with the creation of the Daleks and Davros, Terry Nation. The series starred original First Doctor William Hartnell, with the late Adrienne Hill as short-lived companion Katarina (the first companion to be killed off in the middle of a serial), and Peter Purves as the era’s better-known companion, Steven Taylor.
“The Dalek’s Master Plan” is also noteworthy as it’s the first serial in which the late actor Nicholas Courtney appeared, playing the character of Bret Vyon. Courtney would go on to play the long-running, iconic Head of UNIT and Doctor’s companion Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart (father of the current head of UNIT, Kate Lethbridge-Stewart, played by Jemma Redgrave).
“The Nightmare Begins” and “Devil’s Planet,” Episodes 1 and 3 of ‘The Dalek’s Master Plan,” from Doctor Who Season 3, will debut on the BBC’s iPlayer in the U.K. on Sunday, April 5, 2026. We have reached out to BritBox to see whether the episodes will also be added to its comprehensive Classic Who collection and, if so, when. We will update this post if and when we hear back.
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