WEBVTT 00:30.000 --> 00:39.800 ¶¶ 00:39.800 --> 00:49.800 ¶¶ 00:49.800 --> 00:59.800 ¶¶ 00:59.800 --> 01:20.560 The Celestial Toymaker was first transmitted by the BBC in April 1966. It was the first 01:20.560 --> 01:25.760 serial to be produced by Ennis Lloyd and it boasted a spectacular supporting cast, most 01:25.760 --> 01:31.120 notably Michael Goff as the toymaker himself. Now the absence of the Doctor from the middle 01:31.120 --> 01:35.600 two episodes was the first attempt by the BBC production office to write Bill Hartnell 01:35.600 --> 01:39.840 out of the series. By not having the Doctor there for the majority of the story meant 01:39.840 --> 01:45.060 that there was plenty of opportunity to bring in a new leading character in the final episode. 01:45.060 --> 01:49.080 But that wasn't to be because in the meantime the BBC renewed Bill's contract and he was 01:49.080 --> 01:52.560 able to continue in the series for another five stories, which is a little bit more than 01:52.560 --> 01:57.440 could be said for me. The screening of the third episode, which was called The Dancing 01:57.440 --> 02:01.600 Thor, brought a complaint from the estate of the author Frank Richards, complaining 02:01.600 --> 02:06.080 that his character Billy Bunter perhaps had been used in an unauthorised fashion and at 02:06.080 --> 02:11.600 the same time viewers to the serial complained that a much loved literary character was being 02:11.600 --> 02:16.320 made far too evil. Luckily the situation was put right very easily the following week by 02:16.320 --> 02:23.240 a continuity announcement which just said simply that Cyril was a Bunter-like character. 02:23.240 --> 02:27.480 All episodes of The Celestial Toymaker were assumed completely lost. That is until the 02:27.480 --> 02:35.280 spring of 1984 when a 16mm tele-recording was found in the vaults of ABC Television 02:35.280 --> 02:40.880 in Australia and that was a recording of the final test. Maybe they thought it was cricket 02:40.880 --> 02:44.240 and that's why they kept it there in the vaults but it wasn't, it was part of The 02:44.240 --> 02:50.200 Celestial Toymaker, the final episode. Now I actually kept and owned for some little 02:50.200 --> 02:56.200 time the spectacular Trilogic game. A beautiful piece of construction and a very fine game 02:56.200 --> 03:00.600 to play but I felt it brought me bad luck and when finally after being out of work for 03:00.600 --> 03:06.280 18 months I consigned it to the dustbin my career suddenly took off. So perhaps the malignant 03:06.280 --> 03:13.240 influence of The Toymaker was still manifesting itself. Now there are no known tele-snaps 03:13.240 --> 03:18.960 or off-screen photographs of The Celestial Toymaker in existence. So consequently this 03:18.960 --> 03:24.960 reconstruction has been made using previously unpublished on-set photographs and publicity 03:24.960 --> 03:31.640 material. So why not sit back now and enjoy this loose-canon reconstruction of The Celestial 03:31.640 --> 03:43.640 Toymaker.