Lost 'Doctor Who' Adventure "The Savages" Latest To Be Released as Animation
As a show rolling into its 62nd year, Doctor Who has a few singular issues due to its long run. The most obvious is the number of seasons, as the program has started over with Season 1 twice since its original 1963 debut; slightly less well known is the "Lost Episode" problem. Most shows that have been on the air since the early 1960s are soap operas, so the fact that there were no archival standards in place (in the U.K. or the U.S.) until the 1970s isn't something viewers can about overmuch, it's not like anyone is going to go back and watch the black and white episodes of General Hospital or Coronation Street. However, as a science fiction program, Doctor Who tends to attract completionist fans*. At the time, the BBC did not consider this, and reused master tapes as a cost-saving measure, recording over several episodes of the show's first six seasons. Luckily, the audio part of the recordings remained, and since 2006 there has been a slow push to "restore" these episodes via animation.
(*The number of people who worriedly ask if they need to watch the Classic Doctor Who to "get" the new series on Disney+ would be hilarious if it weren't sad that's what's holding them back.)
The latest serial to be recovered from the rubbish bin of BBC history is "The Savages," which had all four episodes taped over after airing in 1966. The serial aired towards the end of the First Doctor's run, as part of Doctor Who's original third season. This was also during the period where the show first traded out companions, as original cast members Carole Ann Ford (Susan Foreman), William Russell (Ian Chesterton) and Jacqueline Hill (Barbara Wright) all left during Season 2, and Ford's initial replacement Maureen O'Brien (Vicki) only lasted eight adventures. At this point in the series, short-timer companions Steven Taylor and Dodo are traveling in the TARDIS, and "The Savages" marks Taylor's exit from the series, whereupon the show cast Michael Craze and Anneke Wills as Ben and Polly, who remained the show's companions through the show's first transition of Doctors from Hartnell to Second Doctor Patrick Troughton.
