Doctor Who: The Daleks’ Master Plan to be released on vinyl
By James Aggas
Whovians and record collectors, here’s some exciting news: the epic Doctor Who serial The Daleks’ Master Plan will soon be released on vinyl!
On 15th February 2019, a brand new Doctor Who vinyl will be released by the BBC. And it’s not just any story, either, as they’re releasing the whole of the twelve-part epic, The Daleks’ Master Plan.
This is a bold one to start off with. Doctor Who vinyls have been released before. But these have usually been either in the form of soundtracks (in the music sense, at least), or exclusive releases from Big Finish. But this will be the first time that the BBC have released an audio recording of a missing story on vinyl.
The reason it’s such a bold choice is the sheer length of the serial. At twelve episodes long, it’s one of the longest serials ever. In some ways, perhaps the longest, if you count The Trial of a Time Lord as four stories rather than just one.
And the release isn’t just including those twelve episodes, either. Mission to the Unknown, a single episode story designed as a prelude to The Daleks’ Master Plan, will also be included. This isn’t surprising. It’s directly linked to the main event, and has been included with the CD release of Master Plan before.
The Daleks’ Master Plan is a bold way of beginning BBC’s range of Doctor Who vinyls. Will it be worth the high price?
(Image credit: Doctor Who/BBC.
Image obtained from: official Doctor Who website.)
A huge release
Unsurprisingly, this means the first missing Doctor Who story released on vinyl will be a very bulky set. Six vinyls comprise Master Plan, plus an additional vinyl for Mission to the Unknown. So that’s seven vinyls altogether. Unsurprisingly, this comes to a very large price of £99.99.
I can see this being an attractive purchase for collectors. But perhaps this won’t be as popular as other items of Doctor Who merchandise, not with that high a price. Perhaps not even as many as Big Finish’s records. Those ones sell out quickly not just for being limited stock, but also because they’re (initially, at least) relatively cheap.
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Still, the BBC are definitely giving the record the collector’s item treatment, at least. The vinyl will be translucent blue for the standard edition, and there’s even a limited edition to be sold from Amazon on heavyweight splatter vinyl.
As for the story itself, as I covered last month, it’s a great epic. An ambitious story with a great sense of scale. A little too silly in the middle, (specifically, the Christmas episode The Feast of Steven,) but on the whole, it’s a strong and epic serial.
However, if you wanted to listen to it, I’d recommend getting it on CD or download first. Like I said, this is definitely a pricey release for the BBC to kick off their range of Doctor Who vinyls with. I’ll be interested to see if this leads to more vinyl releases in the future.
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Will you be getting The Daleks’ Master Plan on vinyl? Which missing stories would you like to see released in the format? Let us know in the comments below.
