Happy (belated) Anniversary to Doctor Who, and not coincidentally to…. us.  This site went live on November 23rd, 1997, which according to our math make us 13 years old.  Awkward in human years, ancient by internet standards, but still kicking it  for content.  Many, many thanx for everyone who regularly uses the site and shares the content (particularly tumblr blogs… holy buckets do these sites love the Tour).

When the site turned five on November 23rd 2002 and adopted a continual display format, we passed the 10000 images in overall site content, with the 10000th image shown to the right.  Last year when we turned 12 the overall image count stood at 76000.  All year long the THT Brain Wizards hoped 100000 images was in sight, and now for the 13th Anniversary a site-wide Tour updates vaults the overall image count over 100000 images for the first time (nearly a 5600 image bump).  Huzzah!

But that's not all…

• As always at this time of year, we've dusted off our annual Holiday tradition…. The original Doctor Who Christmas special, The Feast of Steven.
• We've upped the max. image resolution to 1280 pixels in keeping with increasing usage of higher resolution monitors.
• Caps for the first trailer of "A Christmas Carol" are now online.
• Re-instated the countdown clock for the upcoming Christmas special "A Christmas Carol."

Once again many thanx for your continued patronage for lo these many years.  For the terminally curious, what was the 100000th image?  Look to your left.

And not the much-beloved Robert Vaughn version.  Lots-o-work getting ready for a certain site anniversary coming up, so it's time we got off the fence regarding Death of the Doctor.  We here at THT Worldwide have tired to waiting for a suitable (read that HD) version of the second, Matt Smith intensive, part of this story to grace the airwaves anywhere so we present a schizoid collection of caps from the story, the first half in glorious 720p, the latter in SD.  If and when the second half makes an appearance we'll re-cap it but until then…

So what do we think of Death of the Doctor?  Until the trunk show which (often for good reason) stays away from indulgences in the show's past, SJA is thoroughly unafraid to do so when the occasion warrants.  RTD's return to the DW universe is full of the sentimental gush we've come to expect from him, but as this is a story which hinges on this emotive response from the characters and the audience it feel perfectly justified.  Katy Manning is in form and we were heartened to see the grace notes the story provided about Sarah Jane's, and not Jo's, continued path-crossings with the Doctor, as well as the Doctor and Jo little conversation on the planet.  As for Matt Smith, the man does more with a knowing look than almost any other actor we can think of.

Were there needless continuity references thrown around, especially at the end of the story?  Perhaps.  But the pacing of the story left that for later consideration.  Good for the audience and fans alike.  Well done RTD.  Don't feel that the welcome mat isn't still out.

Images and caps for Death of the Doctor are now online.

On to Christmas!

Regular visitors to the site while Doctor Who is "in season" know that we're usually pretty good at turning images for newly broadcast stories quickly, almost always within 36 hours of initial airing.  We were able to also move with speed last year after The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith (as we learned afterwards this turned out to be the last thing Tennant ever filmed as the Doctor).

We'd like to be able to claim the same this year with "Death of the Doctor."  We have the images set, but have been having growing frustration in getting a cap-worthy copy of the story to work on.  The THT Brain Trust is no fan of on-screen displays and the CBBC logo sits as a deal-breaker for us at the moment.  We're hoping a logo-free version pops loose soon so that we can get a jump on it and beg your indulgence as a site visitor for a couple more days to pull it all together.

Meanwhile strap yourself in for a MAJOR site update coming in November.  That's on track.