Chalky, Enigma, Scooby, Alfie,

& Shirt...

...It's A Celebration !

Guest starring: Tokyo

With Guest Appearances by: Zygon Curry, Macbeth, IndyTimelord & Servalan

It had been going on for such a long time, and now there was cause for celebration. Yes – Enigma and Scooby had (finally) got engaged ! (see E&Sc...Are Very Engaging) Oh, and some sci-fi programme was fifty years old !

A 50th Anniversary Celebration (not a convention, mind you) had been announced at the Access Centre earlier in the year, and it had come down to Chalky (who had been given a ‘free pass’ by Tigger) to book the tickets, due to him being the only one able to access the website whilst at work.

With his laptop surreptitiously positioned on his desk and the website on constant refresh, Chalky pretended to care about teaching his young charges whilst flitting between the ticket website and 'Skaro Headquarters' which had a dedicated and frantic thread filled with people struggling to book tickets. A couple of texts from Zygon Curry established that the special ‘book two hours earlier’ code he had provided Chalky with was wrong – something the 'SH' thread had also identified and some clever bods online worked out the proper code.

By eleven o’clock, Chalky had managed to book six tickets for Sunday 24^th November, the third and final day of the event, for Chalky, Shirt, Enigma, Scooby, Alfie and group newbie, Tokyo. He proceeded to find as many colleagues as possible to share the exciting news with, as well as sending a text to the five other lucky recipients of the Golden Tickets!

Chalky continued to keep his eye on the website and the 'Skaro Headquarters' thread as further autograph, photo and panel opportunities were rumoured to be released at later dates. The 'SH' thread proved very entertaining, filled as it was with numerous fans decrying how awful the convention was going to be before they’d even been…how unlike fans to condemn something before actually experiencing it….

As it transpired, he failed to secure an autograph opportunity with Jenna Coleman for Shirt (a gap in his ‘Companions’ book that would have to remain for the time being) but did manage to book two ‘Classic Panels’, the first of which would prove to be especially advantageous on the day itself.

The Anniversary evening found Enigma and Scooby ending a Who-themed day celebrating their engagement by watching the Special at the cinema, whilst Shirt partook of Chalky and Tigger’s hospitality to watch the episode, the afterparty, and ‘The Fiveish Doctors – Reboot’. Alfie & Tokyo were also watching the episode, the latter eating Fish and Chips which would come back to haunt him. It also became clear that despite refusing the opportunity to accompany her husband and friends to the event when Chalky was booking tickets, Tigger had now changed her mind.

“I want to go!”, she wailed, like an anti-Tenth Doctor.

Shirt decided to leave them to their marital bliss, and all the gang attempted to get an early night ready for the excitement of the next day.

The travel plans had been drawn up by Shirt, based on his knowledge of London (despite his supposed knowledge of Sheffield, a city where he lived for three years, getting Dufus lost on two previous occasions – see CDS...Pretend to be Northern & D&S...Are Valiant T(w)o The End). Shirt’s journey was going perfectly, but unfortunately on arriving at the station, Chalky found that his train had been cancelled. He therefore phoned Enigma, and with her help, caught a bus to another station, where he ended up on the same train as her and Scooby. There was also more bad news – Alfie phoned to say that Tokyo was having a violent vomiting reaction to the previous evening’s Fish and Chips. They would therefore meet them at the Access Centre later. This information was conveyed to Shirt, who simply used the waiting time to see if he could find a set of the promotional ‘Alien Attax’ Dalek cards being given away by ‘The Sun’ (the newspaper, not the celestial body [usually found on Page 3]), the London Victoria branch of V.G. Jones not having them.

The four of them finally having met, Enigma needed to also pop into V.G. Jones to get some food and look for a ‘Wireless Schedule’ with a Paul McGann cover. (She still needs one, if anyone's got a spare). Whilst looking for this, they encountered Servalan, leader of the local group, frequented by Chalky, Dufus and Shirt many year before. Unsurprisingly, she was also on her way to the Celebration, and so the four became five. Moving to the District Line, they all got onto the next train, but Shirt then made the mistake of deviating from his planned route, following Servalan’s suggestion that they get out at Westminster and change onto the Jubilee Line. It soon became clear that the Jubilee Line platforms were closed, and so they had to get back on the next train, and travel to Tower Hill as had been the original plan.

“No more changes to the plan”, stated Shirt in a tone he believed to be commanding.

On arrival, Shirt led the way to the Tower Gateway DLR station, but not until photos had been taken of the UNIT HQ (or ‘The Tower of London’ as it is also known) from the previous evening’s episode. There was a ten minute wait at the station, which Chalky and Shirt used to catch up with Servalan (with Shirt briefly being distracted by a Sherlockian-themed mobile phone advert), and laugh about the Afterparty (in particular the ineffective ‘link-up’ with One Direction in America).

Five minutes after their arrival, the train glided in, and another five minutes later, glided out towards Docklands. Twenty minutes later, and the friends were exiting at Prince Regent, and making their way up to the Access Centre, passing large posters of all eleven Doctors. On the journey, Zygon Curry had been repeatedly texting to bemoan standing in a gigantic queue, but as the friends were booked for the first ‘Classic Lounge’ of the day, they were directed to a different floor, where there was no queue, and where within less than a minute they were all registered (including Servalan who had not even pre-booked for the lounge) and had their event lanyards. Chalky could not resist texting Zygon Curry to inform him of this.

Shirt briefly considered returning to the main event area (bypassing the queues with his lanyard) for a panel with ‘the Mums’ (Adjoa Andoh & Jacqueline King), but decided to remain with the rest of the group for a ‘B/W era panel’.

The time until the panel started was spent in poring over their event schedules, which had been laid out on the chairs in the panel room.

The panel was hosted by Matthew Sweet, and the first interviewee was Peter Purves, swiftly followed by Maureen O’Brien and Wendy Padbury. Shirt was particularly pleased that they showed the clip from ‘The Time Meddler’, with his favourite ‘Billy-fluff’.

Moving back to the main event area, they managed somehow to lose Servalan. Walking into the main hall, via a large television, all were excited that following a short terrace of houses, they found themselves walking between a pair of ‘I.M. Foreman’ gates. Straight ahead inside was the Millennium FX area, and Chalky made sure to have his photo taken with one of the robots from ‘Dinosaurs on a Spaceship’ (but wasn’t sure if it was Mitchell or Webb). Two of the dinosaurs from the same episode were also there, along with several ‘The Rings of Akhaten’ aliens. Moving on round, past the ‘Doctor Who Adventures’ area, they found themselves in the costumes area, which as well as costumes also included Sarah Jane’s cars from ‘K9 and Company’ and ‘The Sarah Jane Adventures’. However, it was another prop from the latter that excited Chalky and Shirt.

“It’s Mr. Smith”, cried Chalky excitedly, getting Shirt to quickly take a photo of him in the attic area, with the Xylok in the background.

Having swapped, Chalky was about to do so for Shirt, but the assistant interjected – “You can stand right in front of it, as long as you don’t touch”.

Shirt didn’t need asking twice, and moved down the attic, right in front of the supercomputer, whilst Chalky took the photo. Chalky then also got a photo right in front of Mr. Smith.

There was a long queue to sit on Clara’s speeder-bike from ‘The Rings of Akhaten’ (and only children seemed to be doing so), so they rejoined Enigma and Scooby and went over to the retail area.

The main BBC shop had a very long queue, even to get in, but they soon found stalls run by Naughty Asteroid, Large Endings and Punch Middle. LE Dogsbody, Paul Spragg, approached them with a copy of ‘Vortex’, the LE magazine.

“I’ve already got one”, said Shirt.

“But it’s a special Celebration issue”, responded Paul.

Taking one, Shirt saw that this was indeed the case, and that despite having the same cover image as the most recent issue, it did say ‘Special Celebration Issue’ on it, and inside the in-depth articles inside had been replaced with adverts for LE’s expanding ranges.

It getting close to the time of their first main panel, the gang made their way into the opposite hall, and into a gigantic queue, their first of the day. As they moved along the barriers, it became clear that the queue split into two, one for each of the doors into the main panel hall. Picking one at random, they waited for about ten minutes until the doors opened. Meanwhile, Alfie had texted to say that he and Tokyo had just arrived at the venue.

Making their way into the hall, the gang made for some raised seating at the back.

“That’s only for people with children”, said a security guard blocking their way.

Shirt thought about saying that Chalky had children, albeit left at home with Tigger, but thought better of it.

Taking their seats, the excitement level was growing. Alfie and Tokyo had also arrived, but had taken seats at the other side of the gigantic hall.

The lights finally went down, which the gang took as their opportunity to start eating the sandwiches that they had brought with them, and the first panel – ‘Regenerations’ – began. This featured Doctors 5-7 being interviewed by Nicholas Briggs, whilst the entire interview was translated into sign-language. Peter was out first, hogging the whole of the first sofa, meaning that when Colin did the same with the other sofa, Sylv initially found himself without anywhere to sit, briefly squatting in the TARDIS which was on-stage, before being accidentally hit in the face by the telephone door which was shut by the sign language interpreter. Seating sorted out, and a superb panel ensued. Highlights included Peter speaking about writing and filming ‘The Fiveish Doctors – Reboot’, Sylv mentioning ‘The Hobbit’ several times, and best of all, Nicholas Briggs repeatedly referring to Nicola Bryant’s cleavage (despite her not even being there) just to make the sign-language interpreter make the less than subtle sign.

Just under an hour later, the lights went up, and contact was made with Alfie and Tokyo, who decided to stay where they were. Zygon Curry also appeared from the raised seating (despite not having any children with him), and Chalky took the opportunity to emphasise their lack of queuing so far. Ten minutes later, and the lights went down again and it was time for the ‘Eleventh Hour’ panel featuring Matt Smith, Jenna Coleman, Steven Moffat and Nick Hurran (director of ‘The Day of the Doctor’).

All seemed relieved that after four previous sessions over the past two days where they could reveal nothing about ‘TDOTD’, all such restrictions were now removed. Matt and Jenna spent the panel playfully teasing each other, whilst Steven and Nick attempted to keep order, and answer interviewer Matthew Sweet’s questions. (Shirt, however, was simply transfixed by Jenna’s shapely legs!). Panel completed, there was an announcement of the Guinness World Record for the most people around the world watching the 50th Anniversary episode. A photo of the cast with the certificate was taken along with the crowd in the background (The gang are still trying to see if they can find themselves in that photo).

Second panel completed, and the gang made for where Alfie and Tokyo stated that they had been sitting. Exiting by the appropriate door, they found them waiting for them on the concourse. Deciding what to next was interrupted by the arrival of Zygon Curry, with some of his party, including Macbeth. He had overbooked for some activities due to his multiple bookings, including the TARDIS console photos and wanted to know if the gang wanted them. Non-committal answers were given, but Shirt finally paid Zygon Curry for his IBF ‘TVM’ ticket.

Moving to the retail area again, the gang took full advantage of Large Endings’ show special offers, including a number of double CDs for £5 each. Enigma bought two multi-doctor stories, ‘The Sirens of Time’ and ‘Light at the End’, whilst Shirt purchased ‘Jago and Litefoot – Series Five’, ‘Mastermind’ and the Klein/Will trilogy. He also got Chalky to buy him ‘The Lady of Mercia’ and ‘Prisoners of Fate’ for Christmas. Moving along, Shirt found John Dorney, getting him to sign his ‘1963: The Assassination Games’. Grumbling at the seeming lack of the lovely Lisa Bowerman, Shirt continued walking, almost immediately finding another Large Endings’ stall with David Warner (Shirt cursing not bringing his Series 7B poster) and LISA BOWERMAN.

The ‘Jago and Litefoot’ box-set was produced, and happily signed by Lisa, once she had once again apologised for not remembering Shirt’s name.

By this time, Chalky had caught up, putting a stop to any flirting by Shirt, and picked up the second ‘Bernice Summerfield’ box-set, believing it to be next one that he needed. Having been disavowed of this by Lisa, she happily signed the correct box-set - TO SHIRT !!!

On realising her mistake, Lisa was very apologetic, crossing out ‘Shirt’ and replacing it with ‘Chalky’.

“It doesn’t matter”, said Chalky, “it makes for a story”, musing on the gang’s history in relation to such mistakes (see CDS...As Seen on TV, CDS...Meet a Blue Peter Badge Winner & S...A Pig of a Problem).

Returning to the main area, and Enigma and Scooby, they also briefly met up with Zygon Curry again, and even more briefly with IndyTimelord. Having wandered around aimlessly (picking up a plethora of small plastic figures for Mavic Chen from the ‘Doctor Who Adventures’ area), they sat down in a panel by Dick Mills of the Radiophonic Workshop. To demonstrate his craft, he showed a clip without music or sound effects, then the same clip with these added. To Chalky’s delight this clip was from ‘Delta and the Bannermen’! Panel completed, and Chalky handed out cakes iced by Tigger in the costumes of the eleven Doctors (& an Adric for Enigma). They had been slightly squashed having been carried around all day, but no less tasty or impressive for that.

The group then took time to watch the short memorial video of Doctor Who luminaries who have sadly left us before the 50^th anniversary. Enigma claimed to have something in her eye. (The eye problem, which Enigma still has, may also have affected others were it not for the slightly unthoughtfully placed ‘talk like Dalek’ stand right next door).

The group then wandered around the far-side of the ‘Production Area’, looking inside make-up trucks and catering buses, before stopping for a brief group photo taken by Zygon Curry.

It was time for the 1980’s ‘Classic Lounge’, but Enigma (and therefore Scooby) refused to attend due to its featuring Bonnie Langford. The other four therefore went back upstairs to the panel room, to listen to anecdotes from Lalla Ward (who seemed in a less than celebratory mood), Mark Strickson and the aforementioned Ms. Langford. [Incidentally, Shirt had sat in the row in front of Bonnie a few weeks before at Wimbledon Theatre watching Joe Pasquale play Sherlock Holmes (don’t ask), and the rest of her row had also included Bobby Davro and Russell Grant. ‘It only needed Christopher Biggins to produce a camp explosion’, commented Chalky when Shirt had told him]. The session was hosted by comedian, Toby Hadoke, who demonstrated fully why he should have presented the recent ‘DW: Ultimate Monsters and Villains Weekend’. Chalky was very pleased that Bonnie’s clips also came from ‘Delta and the Bannermen’ meaning his favourite story was fully represented at the convention – as was its god given right. And they all found out which is the world’s most poisonous snake from Mark. (Unfortunately, none of them can now remember what it was !!)

Scooby and Enigma went around the costumes and special effects exhibits, stopping to take a photo of a Cyberman leisurely sitting on a stool while the other exhibitors were conversing on the history of the Cyberman costume. Scooby piped up and said that he was so glad that the Cybermen have now lost the flared trouser look. Enigma made Scooby take the usual photo of her and the Cyberman, to which after getting back home, found numerous photos of herself with a Cyberman through the many years of fandom.

Scooby was also engrossed in the model making section where models of old classic episodes were on show. Baffling Enigma on the technicalities of how they managed to create each model and getting impressive looks from the exhibitors that were wondering around.

The final main hall session was the ‘SFX Show’. They therefore made their way to the large queue again, picking the other door to enter by this time. Then Zygon Curry wandered past, looking for the rest of his group, whom he had lost.

“Do they have their lanyards to get in ?”, asked Chalky, taking charge in a teachery-way.

“Yes”, mumbled Zygon Curry.

“Well come and sit with us, they can sort themselves out”, thundered Chalky.

Soon all seven were settling in their seats for the show hosted by BBC science presenter Dallas Campbell, with Danny Hargreaves demonstrating his best bangs, fire and weather effects, and breakable doors, as a Cyberman attack was foiled by a young boy dressed as the Doctor and a man dressed as Bannakafalatta.

Back into the main event area via the television and gates, and the newly increased group took the opportunity to look at all the costumes again. Shirt also took the opportunity to have his photo taken next to the Sixth Doctor’s coat. Chalky, meanwhile, was excited that a panel taking place on a nearby stage did not only feature former producer, Phil Collinson, but Annette Badland also.

Shirt finally joined the queue for the BBC shop, and after queuing for ten minutes, finding nothing that he wanted to buy. The rest of the gang on the other side of the partition waited patiently for Shirt to update them on what was actually available and agreed that letting him in as a scout was beneficial in preventing them from wasting time queuing to get in also. Shirt then popped back to the Large Endings’ stall to buy the ‘Gallifrey V’ box-set for Chalky for Christmas, and ‘Gods and Monsters’ for himself.

Exiting the hall, it was agreed that it was time to go home.

“I don’t want to go”, opined Alfie in his best David Tennant voice.

Regardless of this, they retraced their steps to the doors, Chalky taking photos of the posters of the Doctors which were now illuminated (Shirt insisting on standing in front of the Fifth/Sixth Doctor one) as they passed.

Unbeknown to them, Zygon Curry had one last mission. Finding himself surrounded by the convention being ‘taken down’ he spotted the signage used for the autograph area, large blue placards with the guests names on. Using his capacious pockets (or something) he managed to steal away something for surprise Shirt with for Christmas, a board featuring the name of Shirt's beloved. [Just over a months later, a flabbergasted Shirt came ridiculously close to kissing Zygon Curry on unwrapping it – but instead made do with embarrassedly handing over a clearly cheap TARDIS mug]

Descending to the DLR station, 'Chalky's Gang' all got on the next train without checking where it was going.

Shirt reassured them that it would be fine, and that there was a train right behind them that they could change onto at Canning Town, where Alfie and Tokyo would also be getting off.

However, Shirt had overlooked that platforms at various levels at Canning Town, and hence, having said goodbye to Alfie and Tokyo at each level, the other four found that they had just missed the next one to Tower Gateway. The next train was eight minutes later, and fifteen minutes later, they were walking past UNIT HQ again, and back to London Victoria via the District Line. Enigma and Scooby had a short time to wait until their through-train, but Chalky and Shirt had to run off to catch their respective trains. As the six of them made their ways home – they all mused on a Celebration to remember.

[PL/AE/EC]