1999

1999 in

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the DWU • production history • vital statistics • releases

Throughout 1999, much concern was raised on Earth over a feared computer glitch known as Y2K or the Millennium Bug. This had the potential to cause technological havoc as clocks changed from 1999 to 2000 (the "00" in the date being expected to cause problems for many computer systems). The concern ended up being unfounded, though not without some help from one, or possibly two incarnations of the Doctor. (PROSE: Millennium Shock)

Events

• 12 - Adelaide Brooke was born in Finchley, North London. (TV: The Waters of Mars)

• Late December - The Sixth Doctor saved the Earth from Saraquazel, a being from after the universe, and his servant, Ashley Chapel. (PROSE: Millennial Rites)

• 30 - The Seventh Doctor, en route to Gallifrey with the remains of the Master, was forced to land the TARDIS in San Francisco and was caught in the crossfire of a gangland shooting. Ignorance of the Time Lord form meant that his surgeon, Grace Holloway, accidentally killed him. The Master escaped into the city. (TV: Doctor Who)

• 31
  • The Doctor regenerated into his eighth incarnation. The Master took Bruce as a host. He then opened the Eye of Harmony and the Earth started to fluctuate. The Doctor closed the Eye and the Master was consumed by it. (TV: Doctor Who)
  • The Seventh Doctor and Melanie Bush crashed a party hosted by the Auton Alisha Hammerson and prevented another invasion by the Nestene Consciousness. (COMIC: Plastic Millennium)
  • The Fourth Doctor stopped the millennium bug (probably with a little help from his sixth incarnation) just as the New Year arrived. (PROSE: Millennium Shock)
  • While Jack Harkness fought a "Millennium Bug" of his own, Alex Hopkins killed the rest of his Torchwood Three team, then himself after Jack returned, just as the New Year arrived in Cardiff's time zone. Harkness subsequently took over Torchwood Three. (TV: Fragments)
  • Dave Young spent the entire evening trying to convince his girlfriend, Anji Kapoor, that the millennium would not actually begin for another year. Kapoor, for her part, thought this extreme pedantry meant their relationship was in trouble. This incident led to her insisting on New Year's Eve 2000 that the two of them spend 2001 doing "Wild and Spontaneous Things' —the result of which was the couple spontaneously going to Belgium in February 2001. There, she met the Eighth Doctor and began travelling with him. (PROSE: Escape Velocity)
  • The renegade Time Lady Iris Wildthyme and her companion Panda arrived in San Francisco in her TARDIS. Immediately after their arrival, Iris spilled gin into the bus' control and out into Time Vortex, resulting in various different versions of Panda from alternative realities crossing over into the primary universe. With the assistance of Dr. George Strangeways, Iris was able to close the rift, though not before the Panda from the primary universe had been dragged into it. (AUDIO: The Panda Invasion)

Due to time zone differences, the above events technically occurred hours prior to the incident in San Francisco.

Unknown dates

• Terry Brooks was serving as the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom during this year. (PROSE: Millennium Shock)

Behind the scenes

References in the Doctor Who Universe tend to indicate the year 2000 was the start of the millennium, rather than 2001, the technical start of that millennium.

Behind the scenes

• 4 - PROSE: The Face-Eater was first published.
• 4 - PROSE: Salvation was first published.
• 21 - Actor Leslie French died.

• 1 - PROSE: The Taint was first published. Fitz Kreiner became a companion.
• 1 - PROSE: The Mary-Sue Extrusion was first published.
• 1 - PROSE: The Wages of Sin was first published.
• 9 - Actor Buddy Windrush died in Shipley, England.

• PROSE: More Short Trips anthology was first published.
• 1 - PROSE: Demontage was first published.
• 1 - PROSE: Deep Blue was first published.
• 1 - PROSE: Dead Romance was first published.
• 6 - Actor Graham Armitage died in South Africa.
• 12 - The Curse of Fatal Death, a spoof of Doctor Who, was broadcast as part of the BBC's Comic Relief appeal. The special starred Rowan Atkinson as the "Ninth" Doctor and Jonathan Pryce as the Master, and was written by Steven Moffat -- his first televised work in the franchise. Also featured was Joanna Lumley as the first female incarnation of the Doctor featured in a BBC-sanctioned production (and the only one until Arabella Weir in NOTDWU: Exile). The special was also webcast, making it the first original Doctor Who-related production to be distributed this way.

• 05 - PROSE: Revolution Man was first published.
• 05 - Producer John Wiles died.
• 26 - PROSE: Players was first published.

• Only Human was first released. It was the last episode of The Time Travellers to feature Sophie Aldred.
• 10 - PROSE: Dominion was first published.
• 24 - PROSE: Millennium Shock was first published.
• 27 - Actor Donald Morley died.
• 30 - Composer Don Harper died.

• AUDIO: The Choice was first released, the first of two audio dramas in the Adventures in a Pocket Universe series starring Lalla Ward as "the Mistress" (though implied to be Romana II) and John Leeson as K9.
• 2 - The final episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine was broadcast in America.
• 2 - PROSE: Tears of the Oracle was first published.
• 7 - PROSE: Unnatural History was first published.
• 7 - PROSE: Storm Harvest was first published.
• 18 - Actress Aimée Delamain died.
• 30 - Doctor Who Magazine #279 featured the first instalment of a new monthly feature called the Time Team. A group of fans set themselves the task of viewing and reviewing every televised Doctor Who story produced between 1963 and the TV movie of 1996. The Time Team finished this project in DWM #416, published in December 2009.

• AUDIO: The Sirens of Time, a multi-Doctor story co-starring Peter Davison, Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy, was released on cassette tape and CD. This audio drama was the first release by Big Finish Productions under its new licence with the BBC, allowing them to produce officially sanctioned audio productions featuring concepts and cast members from Doctor Who (Big Finish had already released audio dramas featuring Bernice Summerfield.) The Big Finish line prospered over the next decade and helped fill the void left by the lack of a television series prior to 2005. It continued even after the series returned. In 2001, Big Finish scored a coup by launching a long-running series of productions featuring then-current Eighth Doctor, Paul McGann.
• 5 - PROSE: Autumn Mist was first published.
• 5 - PROSE: The Final Sanction was first published.

• REF: The Doctor's Affect, a memoir by onetime K9 assistant operator Stephen Cambden, was first published.
• BBC Audio, after a six-year hiatus, resumed reissuing audio recordings of Doctor Who stories that no longer existed in complete visual form in the BBC Archives. Previously, these recordings had been issued exclusively on twin cassette, but were now also released on CD. Released this month was TV: The Massacre of St. Bartholomew's Eve, which was released under the shorter title, The Massacre.
• 2 - PROSE: Interference - Book One and Interference - Book Two were both first published, the first and only two-volume BBC Books story. This was the introduction of new companion Compassion. The Third Doctor also appeared. Due to both EDA books coming out at once, there was no Past Doctors Adventure this month.
• 2 - PROSE: Return to the Fractured Planet was first published.
• 7 - Actor Ric Felgate died.

• AUDIO: The Search, the second and last episode of Adventures in a Pocket Universe, was first released.
• 5 - Actor Ivor Roberts died.
• 6 - PROSE: The Blue Angel was first published.
• 6 - PROSE: City at World's End was first published.
• 7 - Dragons' Wrath was recorded.
• 13 - Doctor Who Night was broadcast on BBC Two.
• Dance instrumentalists Flytronix + Shere Khan released the 12-inch single "Tardis", which incorporated sound effects from the TV series, on Moving Shadow Records.

• AUDIO: Phantasmagoria was released. This was the first solo Fifth Doctor audio adventure.
• REF: The Nine Lives of Doctor Who was first published.
• The first edition of REF: I, Who, a long running guide to Doctor Who fiction, was published.
• 1 - Actor Noel Johnson died.
• 1 - PROSE: The Joy Device was first published.
• 4 - PROSE: The Taking of Planet 5 was first published.
• 4 - PROSE: Divided Loyalties was first published.
• 17 - This was the twentieth anniversary of Doctor Who Magazine.
• 30 - Actor Cavan Kendall died.
• 31 - "Treehouse of Horror X", an episode of the American series The Simpsons, was broadcast. The episode included a cameo appearance by the Fourth Doctor, who was kidnapped along with other TV icons, such as Xena, by the Comic Book Guy.

• AUDIO: Whispers of Terror was released. This was the first solo Sixth Doctor audio adventure. Nicola Bryant began a prolific stint with Big Finish Productions, voicing many audios as Peri Brown for both the Fifth and Sixth Doctors.
• REF: A Critical History of Doctor Who on Television, by noted literary critic John Kenneth Muir, was first published.
• 1 - PROSE: Corpse Marker was first published.
• 1 - TV: The Five Doctors became the first episode of Doctor Who to be released to DVD by BBC Video when it was released in the digital format in the UK. This started an extensive and long-running series of archival DVD releases chronicling the series that continued for more than a decade.
• 13 - BBC2 broadcast Doctor Who Night, an evening of episodes, documentaries and comedy sketches.
• 13 - Tom Baker and Douglas Adams discussed Doctor Who on the BBC Radio 4 programme Today.
• 13 - Doctor Who was featured on the cover of the Radio Times, promoting upcoming rebroadcasts of the classic episodes.
• 24 - Actor Hilary Minster died.
• 28 - PROSE: Frontier Worlds was first published.

• 2 - PROSE: Twilight of the Gods was first published, bringing to a close the Virgin Bernice Summerfield New Adventures series of books, which began as the Virgin New Adventures series in 1991. The publication of this book ended an era, concluding the book-publishing relationship between the Doctor Who franchise and Virgin Books/W.H. Allen/Target that had begun in 1973.
• Actor Tommy Wright died.
• 06 - This was the tenth anniversary of the broadcast of the final episode of TV: Survival, which ended Doctor Who's original twenty-six-season run on the BBC.
• 21 - Actor Jack Le White died.
• 21 - Actor John Arnatt died.
• 25 - Actor Peter Jeffrey died at Stratford-upon-Avon from prostate cancer.