50 episodes of Doctor Who Literature, and this episode releases of the first anniversary of my original trailer for the then-forthcoming podcast, November 6. It's been a fun and rewarding year, we've read some great books and interviewed some great guests. Thanks to all of you who have been along for all or part of this journey.

"The War Games" is surely one of Doctor Who's best -- and most groundbreaking -- TV serials. The novelization by Malcolm Hulke has not quite received perhaps quite so much love, but we try to remedy that over the course of this episode.

Joining Jason this week is Ross from Gallifrey's Most Wanted Podcast as well as Stop! Let's Team Up. We discuss War Games, Jack Kirby, and Eli Wallach; and reflect on some of the badly-dated language used in the 1970s to denote race in the Target novelizations.

Many other special guests stop by this week to remember "The War Games" (TV and book) and to wish the podcast a happy 50th episode.

Read more about Rudolph Walker, who had a too-small part in Episodes Four and Five of "The War Games".

Pete Seeger's rousing rendition of "John Brown's Body", a fight song for the Union Army in the American Civil War, as referenced in the novelization.

Eli Wallach's excellent autobiography was published in 2005. The actor passed away a few years later at age 99.

"Doctor Who and the War Games" features cover art by John Geary.

Doctor Who Literature is now a member of the Direction Point Doctor Who podcast network.

Please e-mail the pod at [email protected].

And, incidentally, a Happy Halloween, to all of you at home.

"Doctor Who and the Image of the Fendahl" features cover art by John Geary.

Please e-mail the pod at [email protected].

For the third straight week on Doctor Who Literature, we are examining the novelization of a Bob Baker & Dave Martin TV episode. Made at the very beginning of the Graham Williams era, the first story produced as part of Season 15, this proves to be a somewhat rocky maiden voyage for Doctor Who's incoming producer, and the scripts that Williams was handed... probably did not help matters. There are some terrific ideas on the page and some terrific visual effects on screen, especially in Part One, but, this week's guest (the inaugural member of the Doctor Who Literature Five-Timers club), Si Hart (@Si_Hart) and I, sure have a lot of fun breaking down what went wrong.

Jason and Si also apply our Retrospective Script Editor hats to try and improve several Classic Doctor Who stories, such as "The Time Monster", and we revisit a COVID-inspired trip through the Jon Pertwee era.

Among the many other places you can catch Si is on the Maximum Power Podcast, which is about to launch its second season.

And catch Jason on the most recent episode of the Trap One Podcast discussing the Power of the Doctor trailer.

"Doctor Who and the Invisible Enemy" features cover art by Roy Knipe.

Doctor Who Literature is now a member of the Direction Point Doctor Who podcast network.]

Doctor Who Literature is now a member of the Direction Point Doctor Who podcast network.

This week we are joined by Dale Smith, a prolific writer of both Doctor Who fiction and non-fiction. Dale talks about two of his Doctor Who novels and his recent Black Archives volume on "The Talons of Weng-Chiang". You can find Dale's masterful website detailing his writing career here, and can purchase his Black Archives volume here. We've talked a lot about "Talons" on Doctor Who Literature lately, but Dale's literally written the book on the subject, and this was a particularly fascinating conversation.

Several program notes this week. We're a big hit in France. The fabulous novelization cover by Roy Knipe generates much talk on Twitter. A major change to the show coming next week -- tune in and find out --

-- but before you do that, stick around this week. The always funny and ever-unpredictable Bill Evenson (of The Frankenstein Minute Podcast and Reality Bomb!) is back. We discuss Frankenstein, his Doctor Who humor book (co-written with repeat Doctor Who Literature guest Stacey Smith?), which is the better show: Breaking Bad or Better Call Saul, and... occasionally, just very occasionally, we talk about "Doctor Who and the Sontaran Experiment".

Please e-mail the pod at [email protected].

There comes a time in every Doctor Who podcast's life -- and I'm sure I'll have plenty of them -- where the episode under discussion just isn't that good. This is one of those weeks, but it's a tribute to Doctor Who in general that it took 44 weeks' worth of books to get to this point.

This week in September 2022 saw the announcement of the title of the next Doctor Who episode ("The Power of the Doctor"), although not the release date. This week also saw "Cobra Kai" Season 5 drop on Netflix, though that's of slightly less importance to fandom.

It's been a busy week in world news, especially in England, with the selection of a new Prime Minister, the passing of the Queen, and the accession of a new King.

Please e-mail the pod at [email protected].

Steven B. (@steedstylin) from the excellent New To Who podcast is a first-time guest this week. We have much to discuss about "Tomb of the Cybermen", which premiered 55 years ago this week. We take a look at some of the TV story's more questionable choices on race and ethnicity, and discuss what it was like to watch this story in 1967 when it first aired, versus 1992 when it was recovered after being thought lost, versus today. Steven also enthuses over the novel's cover art, and we discuss the great work of Jeff Cummins and other titans of the Target cover-painting range.