Doctor Who Extra

Doctor Who Extra

2014-15

Subject:

The making of Doctor Who episodes

Broadcast on:

BBC Red Button

Broadcast with:

Doctor Who

Runtime:

10 minutes, 1-2 minutes

Key crew

Narrator:

Matt Botten

Director:

Ian Smith

Executive producers:

Steven Moffat, Brian Minchin


← Previous	Next →
Doctor Who Confidential	Inside Look

Doctor Who Extra was a documentary spin-off series attached to episodes of Doctor Who. Otherwise exclusive to the BBC Red Button on television and BBC iPlayer online, the initial instalment was screened in cinemas following the theatrical simulcast of the series 8 premiere, Deep Breath. In the series 8 format, each instalment has a runtime of just over 10 minutes, similar to that of the former Confidential Cut Down. During series 9, episodes were much shorter, ranging between 1 and 2 minutes only.

Confidential replacement[[edit] | [edit source]]

Doctor Who Extra was conceived as a smaller scale replacement for Doctor Who Confidential, which ended in 2011 with the Series 6 finale, The Wedding of River Song, having been cancelled by BBC Three. Though Confidential concluded production, plans were announced to revive it in 2013, while short behind-the-scenes features were aired in conjunction with series 7.

In August 2014, in the run-up to the premiere of series 8 and the start of Peter Capaldi's tenure as the Twelfth Doctor, the BBC announced the new behind the scenes show to accompany the series, Doctor Who Extra.^[1]

A Doctor Who Extra was released for the first series 9 prequel, Prologue, on 11 September 2015. Multiple mini Doctor Who Extra episodes were then released for each episode of series 9. Regular length Doctor Who Extra episodes in the Series 8 format were released for every story in Series 9 on home media, as well as the series 10 stories The Return of Doctor Mysterio and Twice Upon a Time.

Differing content[[edit] | [edit source]]

The programme sometimes had episodes with significantly different content, depending upon the venue. For example, the episode which accompanied The Return of Doctor Mysterio was radically different in its Fathom Events/BBCA theatrical form than it was in the much shorter form it had as a part of the iTunes release of that story. As of October 2018^[update], differences between the iTunes releases in different markets, as well as those between the US iTunes Store and the BBC Red Button are not well-researched.

Follow-up series[[edit] | [edit source]]

Although every episode of the Capaldi era had an Extra-like companion documentary, the name of the series changed for Capaldi's last series. It morphed, on screen, into Inside Look, save for his final episode. Likewise, it's the spiritual parent of the Whittaker-era Closer Look.