Slipback

Slipback is a radio audio drama based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who, produced by the BBC and first broadcast in six episodes on BBC Radio 4 from 25 July to 8 August 1985, as part of a children's magazine show called Pirate Radio Four. It was later released on cassette and CD, most recently by BBC Audio and free with the 27 April 2010 edition of The Daily Telegraph newspaper via WHSmith.

Synopsis

The Sixth Doctor and Peri arrive on a mysterious space liner, where intergalactic policemen are investigating art thefts, a computer is suffering from a split personality and the Captain's disease threatens every living thing on the ship…

Continuity

The end of this story, where the Vipod Mor is sent back to the beginning of creation and causes the Big Bang, seems to contradict the explanation for the same event in Terminus.

Production

• This audio adventure was written to fill the long gap in production between Seasons 22 and 23 while the programme was on an enforced hiatus (see History of Doctor Who). It was the first full Doctor Who adventure to be produced for radio. (A previous production, The Pescatons, is sometimes considered a radio play but it was actually a story record for children.) No further radio productions would be mounted until the mid-1990s when Jon Pertwee provided the voice of the Doctor in two serials.
• Valentine Dyall played the Black Guardian in the television series. Dyall died in June 1985, a month before Slipback would air.
• Eric Saward was a script editor for the series and wrote the stories The Visitation, Earthshock, Resurrection of the Daleks and Revelation of the Daleks.

In print

Slipback

Author	Eric Saward
Cover artist	Paul Mark Tams
Series	Doctor Who book: Target novelisations
Publisher	Target Books
Publication date	21 August 1986 (Hardback) 15 January 1987 (Paperback)
Pages	144
ISBN	0-426-20263-5

A novelisation of this serial, written by Eric Saward, was published by Target Books in April 1986. It was the first novelisation of a non-televised Doctor Who story. Saward's novelisation expands on the radio play greatly, with an extensive prologue running a good third of the book before the Doctor appears and the adaptation of the radio play storyline begins. It sold the least copies of any of the Target range.

Audio releases

Slipback was released in November 1988 on a double audio cassette along with the 1978 LP version of Genesis of the Daleks.^[1] It was subsequently released as a standalone CD in January 2001.^[2]

References

External links

• Slipback at the Doctor Who Reference Guide

Reviews

• Slipback reviews at The Doctor Who Ratings Guide

Target novelisation

• On Target — Slipback
• The Cloister Library - Slipback