Didn’t get enough of John Hurt’s grizzled War Doctor? The acting icon is returning to the role in a new audio series from Big Finish! The War Doctor’s audio adventures will be stretch over four box sets, each containing three linked hour-long episodes. The first box set, Only The Monstrous, will be written and directed by Nicholas Briggs, whose previous work includes the BBC Audio Award-winning masterpiece Doctor Who: Dark Eyes.
The War Doctor first appeared in Doctor Who’s Fiftieth Anniversary special “The Day of the Doctor”, where he played an important role in fighting the Time War alongside the Tenth and Eleventh Doctors, David Tennant and Matt Smith. The War Doctor is a darker incarnation of the character, and rejects the title of Doctor as he feels he has a more murderous role to play.
Only The Monstrous will be released in December 2015, and will be followed in February 2016 by the second volume, Infernal Devices, written by John Dorney, Phil Mulryne and Matt Fitton. Volumes Three and Four are currently in pre-production. And if you’d like even more Time War, Paul McGann will return as the Eight Doctor in Doctor Who: The Eighth Doctor — The Time War, which will follow the early days of the conflict, in November 2017. This is especially exciting new for people who loved McGann’s turn, and the idea of exploring the Time War in more depth presents so many possibilities!
Big Finish producer David Richardson is thrilled to be working with John Hurt, saying “What an utter privilege it is to work with such an iconic actor, playing such a brilliantly devised role… this is Doctor Who at its darkest—the era in which our hero casts aside his core values in order to try and save the galaxy in its most terrible hour. We promise bold and brilliant story-telling with gripping character drama, and epic and cinematic audio productions.”
We love the sound of darker audio stories, and we’re excited that Big Finish is working with “new” Doctors now! Could there be a Tenth Doctor adventure in our futures? And speaking of dark…could we drag the Ninth back into the fold? You can check out more information on the series over at Big Finish!