Doctor Who Vs. From Hell

The most recent cinematic depiction of
the Whitechapel Murders of 1888 was
this big-budget Hollywood thriller, 
directed by the Hughes brothers, and
released by Fox in 2001.

Based on the graphic novel series of the
same name by Alan Moore and Eddie
Campbell (originally published in Taboo
from 1989 to 1992, then issued in a
collected edition in 1999), the film also
presents the most widely known theory
behind the Jack the Ripper mystery -
the Royal conspiracy.

The cast was led by Johnny Depp and
Robbie Coltrane as real-life detectives,
Inspector Frederick Abberline (1843-
1929) and Sergeant George Godley
(1856-1941). Heather Graham
portrayed the final canonical victim, Mary Kelly (who actually survived
here), Ian Holm was royal doctor, Sir William Gull (who became a Ripper suspect in the 1970's), and Ian Richardson was Sir Charles Warren (1840-1927), the beleaguered Metropolitan Police Commissioner.

From Hell was shown again on the 5Star channel last night, and also
featured eighteen Doctor Who cast and crew connections:

• Ian McNeice (Coroner Drudge) played Winston Churchill in Victory of the Daleks and The Wedding of River Song (a role reprised by Big Finish for The Churchill Years and Ravenous), and voiced Zeus for Immortal Beloved (2007), and Reginald Harcourt for Renaissance Man (2012)
• Susan Lynch (Liz Stride) was Angstrom in The Ghost Monument
• Lesley Sharp (Kate Eddowes) was Sky Silvestry in Midnight
• Samantha Spiro (Martha Tabram) was Hazran in The Doctor Falls
• Joanna Page (Ann Crook) was Queen Elizabeth I in The Day of the Doctor
• Paul Rhys (Dr. Ferral) voiced Max Paul for The Scapegoat (2009)
• Mark Dexter (Prince Eddy) was Dad in Silence in the Library and Forest of the Dead 
• David Schofield (McQueen) was Odin in The Girl Who Died, and voiced Billy for Death in Blackpool (2009), and Nostradamus and Conclave Leader for The Doomsday Quatrain (2011)
• Sophia Myles (Victoria) was Reinette in The Girl in the Fireplace, and voiced Rania Chuma for Kill the Doctor! and The Age of Sutekh (both 2018)
• Vincent Franklin (George Lusk) voiced Lord Stormblood for Doom Coalition 2 (2016)
• Steve John Shepherd (Constable) voiced Simon Devlin for UNIT: Extinction (2015)
• Donald Douglas (Director) was Vural in The Sontaran Experiment
• John Owens (Governor) was Thorpe in The Daemons
• Gary Powell (Constable) was Dev Ashton in 42
• Anthony Parker (John Merrick, the Elephant Man) was a Millennium FX technician on The Family of Blood, Utopia, The Sound of Drums, Last of the Time Lords, The Rebel Flesh, The Almost People, Dinosaurs on a Spaceship and The Snowmen
• Rupert Holliday Evans (Sailor) was Colonel Mace in The Sontaran Stratagem and The Poison Sky
• James Greene (Governor) was the Abbott in The Bells of Saint John
• sound mixer John Taylor was a boom operator on The Five Doctors

Doctor Who Vs. Burke and Hare

Simon Pegg and Andy Serkis portrayed the notorious 19th century serial killers, Burke
and Hare in this British black comedy.
David Tennant was originally
cast as Hare, but was replaced
by Serkis. The film was directed
by cult film maker John Landis,
writer of An American Werewolf 
in London.

During 1827 and 1828, two 
Irish immigrants, William Burke 
and William Hare perpetrated 
seventeen murders in the West 
Port area of Edinburgh, and sold 
the corpses to the anatomy 
lecturer, Dr. Robert Knox. The killers were only prosecuted when Hare was
given immunity to implicate his accomplice. Burke was hanged in 1829. Ironically, the bodies of executed criminals were then dissected, and Burke's skeleton is still displayed at the city's Medical College. Knox (played by Tom Wilkinson) never faced any criminal charges, and was forced to leave Scotland when the Anatomy Act (which outlawed 'body-snatching') was passed in 1832.

The second cinema depiction of these murders (released in 2010) was shown 
on BBC Two again last night, and featured Christopher Lee, Isla Fisher, Tim 
Curry, Ronnie Corbett and twenty Doctor Who cast and crew connections:

• Pegg (Burke) played the Editor in The Long Game, and voiced Don Chaney for Big Finish's Invaders From Mars (2002)
• Bill Bailey (Angus) was Droxil in The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe
• Jessica Hynes (Lucky) was Joan Redfern in Human Nature and The Family of Blood, then (that character's great-granddaughter) Verity Newman in The End of Time, and voiced Glory Bee also for Invaders From Mars
• David Schofield (Fergus) voiced Nostradamus for The Doomsday Quatrain (2011), and Billy for Death in Blackpool (2009), then starred in The Girl Who Died as Odin
• Steve Spiers (Doorman) was Commissioner Strickland in Aliens of London and World War Three
• Hugh Bonneville (Harrington) was Captain Henry Avery in The Curse of the Black Spot (and briefly in A Good Man Goes to War and The Wedding of River Song)
• Duncan Duff (Attendant) was a Newsreader in Rise of the Cybermen and The Age of Steel, and voiced Joe Hartley for Night Thoughts (2006)
• Jenny Agutter (Lucy) voiced Sekhmet for The Bride of Peladon (2008)
• John Woodvine (Lord Provost) was the Marshal of Atrios in The Armageddon Factor, and voiced Galileo Galilei for Doom Coalition: The Galileo Trap (2015)
• Christopher Obi (Martin) was George in Closing Time
• Michael Smiley (Patterson) was Colonel Morgan Blue in Into the Dalek, and voiced Seedleson for Creatures of Beauty (2003)
• George Potts (Dr. Lister) voiced Ruben and Guard for You Are The Doctor and Other Stories (2015)
• Christian Brassington (Charles) voiced Alfred Stahlbaum for The Silver Turk (2011), and was the Editor in The Five(ish) Doctors
• Reese Shearsmith (Mackenzie) and Paul Davis (Patient) both starred in Sleep No More, as Rassmussen and King Sandman respectively, whilsr Shearsmith was also Dan Matthews in the two Auton VHS spin-offs, Andrew Powell in the PROBE video series, and depicted Patrick Troughton in An Adventure in Space and Time
• Danielle de Costa was also a stunt performer on Voyage of the Damned and Night Terrors
• Gary Hoptrough was a stuntman on The Runaway Bride and Let's Kill Hitler too
• stuntman Curtis Rivers was John Barrowman's stunt double on Utopia, The Sound of Drums and Torchwood
• prosthetics supervisor Waldo Mason was in the SFX crew for Aliens of London
• Lisa McDiarmid was also the stand-by art director on The Sound of Drums, Last of the Time Lords, Torchwood and the pilot episode of The Sarah Jane Adventures
• Neal Champion was the SFX supervisor on An Adventure in Space and Time too

Doctor Who Vs. The First Men in the Moon

First serialised by The Strand 
magazine and described as one
of the "fantastic stories" of
H G Wells (1866-1946), this
influential sci-fi romance was
published in 1901. The story
was adapted for cinema in
1919 and 1964.
Professor Arthur Cavor, his invention Cavorite, and lunar natives Selenites all appeared in The Martian War, Kevin J Anderson's 2006 sequel to Wells' The War of the Worlds.
The third, most faithful TV
adaptation of the novel was written by Mark Gatiss (who
also played Cavor), and was first shown in October 2010.
Repeated on BBC Four last night, the period drama (made by Can Do Productions) featured fifteen other Doctor Who cast and crew alumni:

• Rory Kinnear (Bedford) voiced Samuel Belfrage for Big Finish's Industrial Evolution (2011)
• Peter Forbes (Dad) voiced Philip for Unbound; Deadline (2003), Kryson for The Juggernauts (2005), Craig Swanson for The Feast of Axos, and Thorn for The Bounty of Ceres (2014)
• Katherine Jakeways (Mum) voiced Jill for Nightshade (2016)
• Julia Deakin (Mrs. Fitt) voiced Hannah Fry for Phantasmagoria (1999), and Harriet Griffin for Terror Firma (2005)
• Lee Ingleby (Chessocks) voiced Samson Griffin for Terror Firma (2005)
• Philip Jackson (Grand Lunar voice) voiced Laxton for Valhalla (2007), and Mr. Peabody for The Contingency Club (2017)
• prolific Big Finish actor Ian Hallard (Phi-Oo) voiced Sabian for Primeval (2001), Mouse and Winkler for Invaders From Mars, the Matrix for Neverland (both 2002), Zeuro for A Storm of Angels, Castellan Wynter for Gallifrey: Lies and Pandora (both 2005), Joseph Banks for The Transit of Venus, Captain Cannibal for Izzy's Story, John Polidori for Mary's Story (all 2009), Duncan for An Earthly Child (2010), Comtech Bron Kell for Dark Eyes 2: Time's Horizon, and Davent for Destroy the Infinite (both 2014) - he also portrayed director Richard Martin in An Adventure in Space and Time, and was Alan-a-Dale in Robot of Sherwood
• Steven Pemberton (Sun) was Strackman Lux in Silence in the Library and Forest of the Dead
• Reece Shearsmith (Moon) was Andrew Powell in the PROBE video spin-off series, Dr. Dan Matthews in the Auton VHS releases, depicted Patrick Troughton in An Adventure in Space and Time, then was Rassmussen in Sleep No More
• Robert Judd (Celenite) was property master on Gatiss' anniversary biopic
• Liana Del Giudice was also film editor on The Empty Child, The Doctor Dances, The Christmas Invasion, New Earth, School Reunion and The Day of the Doctor
• assistant editor David Fisher was editor on Series 11
• Chris Hutchinson was animator on Twice Upon a Time too
• Graham Frake (cinematographer) and Shirley Schumacher (assistant camera operator) also both worked on The Beast Below and Victory of the Daleks