Doctor Who has dropped a first-look teaser trailer for The Abominable Snowmen, the latest animated recreation of a missing adventure from the long-running sci-fi drama.
As fans are well aware, 97 episodes of Doctor Who have been lost to time due to a since-scrapped BBC policy that saw them deleted from the broadcaster’s archives.
This has proved particularly damaging to Patrick Troughton’s time as the Second Doctor, given that almost half of his adventures in the role are incomplete.
The good news is that all of the affected episodes still exist in audio form thanks to recordings made by fans, which have been a great help in reconstructing them in the medium of animation.
The Abominable Snowmen originally consisted of six parts aired from September to November 1967, which saw the Second Doctor and his companions Jamie McCrimmon (Frazer Hines) and Victoria Waterfield (Deborah Watling) arrive in the Himalayas in 1935.
Soon after, the Time Lord is blamed for a number of gruesome murders, but the true perpetrators are a tribe of Yeti who have suddenly turned violent after years of living harmoniously with the humans.
“Suddenly they become savage,” says a voice in the teaser trailer. “Did we not wonder why?”
You can watch the teaser below, with the full six-part serial now available to pre-order on Amazon UK in two formats, either as a Blu-ray/Steelbook or on DVD.
Russell Minton, executive producer of The Abominable Snowmen, said: “We’re delighted to announce Doctor Who: The Abominable Snowmen, something Doctor Who fans have been waiting patiently for over the years.
“We’re grateful for the surviving audio-only recordings, which we are very lucky to have courtesy of several Doctor Who fans, which have allowed us to create another exciting and action-packed chapter in the Doctor’s story.”
The Abominable Snowman will be released on DVD and Blu-ray next year, with the physical release containing the fully animated six-part series as well as the only surviving original chapter in the story.
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