United Arab Emirates

UNITED ARAB EMIRATES is a state in the Persian Gulf, Middle East.

Dubai and Abu Dhabi are the two major cities in the Emirates (UAE) - and the country is only ever identified in BBC records under those names rather than as the UAE.

Profile

Country Number (xxx)	1974?	SECOND WAVE
Region	Middle East	.
Television commenced	1969	.
Colour System	1974	PAL
Population	19xx	xx mill
TV Sets	19xx	xx mill
Language/s	Arabic and English	.

Television Stations / Channels

TV started on the XXXXXXX channel, based in Abu Dhabi.

In 1977, a secondary channel commenced - based in Dubai. This catered specifically for both Arabic and English broadcasts.

NEED TO GO THOUGH ALL WRTHs AND TABLE THE DIFFERNET STATIONS BETWEEN 1975 AND 1984.

NEED TO READ PAGES FROM THAT BOOK TO FIND OUT ABOUT CHANNELS AND LANGUAGES

AT A GUESS, I WOULD SAY THE FIRST BATCH OF PERTWEES (dubbed into Arabic) AIRED ON ABU DHABI CHANNEL (7?????). POSSIBLY JUST AAA TO ACCOUNT FOR SJW DATING - although it says 1977 (AND MAYBE CARRY-OVER ONTO 1987 LIST????)

THE NEXT RUN WAS ON DUBAI CHANNEL 10 - TO END OF 4L (NEED TO DETERMINE WHEN THIS STATION STARTED)

THE NEXT RUNS - 4M onwards - WERE ON DUBAI CHANNEL 33.

ادكتورهو (Al Doctor Who)

DOCTOR WHO IN THE UNITED ARAB EMIRATES

It appears that the Emirates was also the only country to screen Planet of the Daleks in colour.

The Emirates was one of the first countries to be sold the Tom Baker stories at the same time as the Netherlands, and certainly before Australia.

BBC Records

A BBC memo dated 10 December 1973 records Abu Dhabi as one of the countries to which episodes "dubbed into Arabic" had been sold.

In 1973, BBC Managing Director, Huw Weldlon, spoke of seeing "Dr Who dubbed into Arabic (see the Arabic and WRTH pages for more on this).

The Seventies records a sale of "(22)" stories to Dubai by 28 February 1977. This 1977 memo actually records Dubai twice for AAA, so the correct total is actually 21: AAA, KKK, RRR, PPP, QQQ, SSS, UUU, XXX, YYY, ZZZ, 4A, 4B, 4C, 4D, 4E, 4F, 4G, 4H, 4J, 4K, and 4L.

In DWM', Dubai is identified under 25 story Archives: nine Pertwees: the same as above, but not XXX; and the same 11 Tom Bakers as above, plus: 4M, 4N, 4P, 4Q, and 4R.

In The Eighties - THE LOST CHAPTERS, there are "(37)" sales noted for Dubai, plus "(1)" recorded for Abu Dhabi. It's not clear why there should be a separate listing for Abu Dhabi in 1987; it's possible this is a carry-over of a pre-1977 sale, or simply a "duplication" of the sales to Dubai.

The total of "(37)" would apply to the ten Pertwees, plus 27 Bakers - which takes the tally up to the middle of season 16. Or alternatively, it is the 11 Bakers plus an additional 16, which takes the tally up to the middle of season 18. This is supported by the fact that season 18 was indeed airing through to late 1986.

Stories bought and broadcast

JON PERTWEE

Ten stories, 48 episodes:

AAA	Spearhead from Space	4
KKK	Day of the Daleks	4
PPP	Carnival of Monsters	4
RRR	The Three Doctors	4
QQQ	Frontier in Space	6
SSS	Planet of the Daleks	6
UUU	The Time Warrior	4
XXX	Death to the Daleks	4
YYY	The Monster of Peladon	6
ZZZ	Planet of the Spiders	6

UAE therefore bought the standard package of Jon Pertwee stories, from GROUPs A to XXXXX.

The programme was supplied as PAL colour video tapes with English soundtracks, with Arabic dubs.

Origin of the Tapes

Hew Weldon mentions viewing episodes of "Dr Who dubbed in to Arabic" in early 1973.

Since UAE only got AAA, KKK, RRR, PPP, QQQ, SSS from the Pertwees first three seasons on PAL video tape, and these were dubbed into Arabic in early 1973, that seems to suggest that the original PAL master tapes of the other Pertwee stories had already been wiped by then. WWW was also not supplied to UAE; again, the master tapes were not available at that time because they had been wiped in August 1974.

TOM BAKER

xx stories, xxx episodes

4A	Robot	4
4B	The Sontaran Experiment	2
4C	The Ark in Space	4
4E	Genesis of the Daleks	6
4D	Revenge of the Cybermen	4
4F	Terror of the Zygons	4
4H	Planet of Evil	4
4G	Pyramids of Mars	4
4J	The Android Invasion	4
4K	The Brain of Morbius	4
4L	The Seeds of Doom	6

The programme was supplied as PAL colour video tapes with English soundtracks, with Arabic dubs.

4M	The Masque of Mandragora	4
4N	The Hand of Fear	4
4P	The Deadly Assassin	4
4Q	The Face of Evil	4
4R	The Robots of Death	4
4S	The Talons of Weng-Chiang	6
4V	Horror of Fang Rock	4
4T	The Invisible Enemy	4
4X	Image of the Fendahl	4
4W	The Sun Makers	4
4Y	Underworld	4
4Z	The Invasion of Time	6
5A	The Ribos Operation	4
5B	The Pirate Planet	4
5C	The Stones of Blood	4
5D	The Androids of Tara	4
5E	The Power of Kroll	4
5F	The Armageddon Factor	6
The Brain of Morbius\|omnibus
5J	Destiny of the Daleks	4
5H	City of Death	4
5G	The Creature from the Pit	4
5K	Nightmare of Eden	4
5L	The Horns of Nimon	4
5N	The Leisure Hive	4
5Q	Meglos	4
5R	Full Circle	4
5P	State of Decay	4
5S	Warriors' Gate	4
5T	The Keeper of Traken	4
5V	Logopolis	4

UAE therefore bought GROUPs A to XXXX of the Tom Baker stories.

The programme was supplied as PAL colour video tapes with English soundtracks.

PETER DAVISON

Fifteen stories, 90 half-hour episodes:

5Z	Castrovalva	4
5W	Four to Doomsday	4
5Y	Kinda	4
5X	The Visitation	4
6A	Black Orchid	2
6B	Earthshock	4
6C	Time-Flight	4
6E	Arc of Infinity	4
6D	Snakedance	4
6F	Mawdryn Undead	4
6G	Terminus	4
6H	Enlightenment	4
6J	The King's Demons	2
6P	Resurrection of the Daleks	4
6R	The Caves of Androzani	4

UAE therefore bought all of GROUP A and B and only part of GROUP C of the Peter Davison stories.

The programme was supplied as PAL colour video tapes with English soundtracks.

COLIN BAKER

One story, 4 episodes: Six stories, equivalent of 26 half-hour episodes: One story, equivalent of 14 half-hour episodes:

6S	The Twin Dilemma	4
6T	Attack of the Cybermen	2/4
6V	Vengeance on Varos	2/4
6W	The Two Doctors	3/6
6X	The Mark of the Rani	2/4
6Y	Timelash	2/4
6Z	Revelation of the Daleks	2/4
7A	The Trial of a Time Lord	14

UAE therefore bought all of the Colin Baker stories.

The programme was supplied as PAL colour video tapes with English soundtracks.

SYLVESTER McCOY

Eight stories, 28 episodes, not screened in correct order:

7D	Time and the Rani	4
7E	Paradise Towers	4
7F	Delta and the Bannermen	3
7G	Dragonfire	3
7H	Remembrance of the Daleks	4
7J	The Greatest Show in the Galaxy	4
7K	Silver Nemesis	3
7L	The Happiness Patrol	3

UAE therefore bought GROUPs A and B the Sylvester McCoy stories.

The programme was supplied as PAL colour video tapes with English soundtracks.

There is no indication that the UAE bought season 26.

Transmission

JON PERTWEE

Some of the Pertwee and early Baker stories have a year of sale recorded against them in BBC records, such as those used by DWM.

The ten Pertwee serials AAA to ZZZ and 11 Bakers 4A to 4L inclusive were sold by February 1977, if not actually all being screened by then. If BBC documents recording when payments were made for music clearances also reflect the year of broadcast and the order in which the stories aired, then those Pertwee and first 17 Baker serials aired in this order:

1975: AAA, KKK, PPP, QQQ, RRR, SSS, UUU, ZZZ, 4A, 4B, 4C, 4D; 1976: 4E; 1976:4K; 1977: 4L, 4M, 4N, 4P, 4Q, 4R, 4S; 1978: YYY, XXX, 4F, 4G, 4H, 4J.

It is known that some of the BBC records are rife with anomalies and inconsistencies with regard to sales dates, so we will give them the benefit of the doubt, and assume that some of these 27 serials did indeed screen out of sequence.

Of note, there are potentially 25 too many airdates from 1977 to 1978 to support the number of available episodes. So, either some episodes were repeated, or several stories aired way out of order.

Of note, the Pertwees and first run of Tom Baker serials aired on the Arabic-only language channel 10. From June 1978, the series switched to the all-English channel 33. This channel switch seems to have coincided with

UUU, XXX YYY potentially at same time as Australia.

ZZZ before Australia.

It may even be that they acquired 4F to 4L first, as these were the "latest", then got 4A to 4E (so that they had all 11 by Feb 77). However they were contractually obligated to screen 4F to 4L first (and not necessarily in order; 4L was second to last), which they did till August 1977. They then aired 4A to 4E with the odd interruption by Family Affair, from October 1977 to March 1978...

Another possibility - they started screening season 14 on channel 10, but had to replace with Family Affair because it was taking too long to dub the episodes. With channel33 due to start up shortly, Doctor Who was dropped, pending its transfer to the English-language only channel, and replaced with Family Affair. For the last 10 weeks billed with Doctor Who, these were possibly repeats (a 4-parter and 6-parters?).

The first serials to air on channel 33 was 4M - which might have already screened in Arabic on channel 10.

Fate of the Tapes

PAL video tapes of The Three Doctors, Planet of the Daleks (4-6 only), Death to the Daleks and Planet of the Spiders were returned to the BBC in 1991. The BBC had lost its own copy of Death to the Daleks part one, so that episode's return from Dubai, meant the BBC once again had a compete copy of the serial.

TOM BAKER

4A to 4L before Australia.

Channel 10:

Doctor Who returned

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Channel 33:

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Fate of the Tapes

Tapes of Pyramids of Mars were returned to the BBC in 1991.

PETER DAVISON

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COLIN BAKER

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SYLVESTER McCOY

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TV listings

← AIRDATES ...... (CLICK ICON TO GO TO TABLE SHOWING EPISODE BREAKDOWN AND AIRDATES - N/S = story title is Not Stated)

TV listings have been obtained from several newspapers, including New United Arab Emiratesn, xxxxxx and xxxxx.

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