Good news for Doctor Who fans ahead of tonight’s 50th Anniversary Special ‘The Day of the Doctor’ – according to the Daily Mirror, the BBC has recovered another seven ‘lost’ episodes of the classic British sci-fi series, with a fan capturing the full William Hartnell serial ‘Marco Polo’ from 1964, which they’d recorded on a cine camera.
Although the recorded footage was silent, it’s said that BBC Worldwide has been painstakingly restoring the soundtrack to the seven episodes, which it plans to air next month. Previously, no footage of any of the seven episodes of ‘Marco Polo’ was thought to have survived. However, a spokesperson for the BBC has played down the reports, stating that: “there are always rumours about missing episodes of Doctor Who but we cannot confirm any new finds.
The news of another potential find comes just six weeks after the BBC confirmed it had recovered nine episodes from the Patrick Troughton serials ‘The Enemy of the World’ and ‘The Web of Fear’, which left episodes still considered ‘lost’.
Originally published November 23, 2013. Updated April 11, 2018.
