Cable and Satellite
Cable and Satellite Stations
Doctor Who has aired on a number of cable and satellite stations over the years, and this was the only method by which some countries - particularly those in Europe during the 1980s and 1990s - could view the series on a regular basis.
The BBC itself was available in parts of western Europe (such as in Spain) from the late 1980s, while the broadcaster also provided programming on other platforms and channels to reach a far wider audience throughout the continent.
Contents
LATIN AMERICA
HBO OLE
Doctor Who aired briefly on this Latin America station:
- See our dedicated HBO OLE page
IMAGEN SATELITAL
Imagen Satelital, a Latin American broadcaster, licensed season 13 (Tom Baker's second season) and possibly also some of the Leela stories from season 14, in 2001, and broadcast to:
- Argentina
- Bolivia
- Chile
- Paraguay
- Uruguay
- And possibly other countries within Central America, such as Belize (Terrance Dicks has mentioned at conventions that he once signed autographs during a visit to Belize in December 2003)
TRANSMISSION
From 1 October 2001, the series was (probably) available on the following satellite channels:
Episodes aired on Sundays at 9:30pm, and again on Monday, at 4:30am!
The serials were broadcast in English but with Spanish subtitles, the first time this method was adopted; previously, broadcasts in Spanish-language countries were dubbed. It would seem that by 2001, the original dubbed tapes that were used from the late 1970s (and owned by Time Life / Lionheart) were no longer available.
Regular screenings had concluded by January 2003.
AUSTRALIA
Doctor Who screened on Australia's FOXTEL / UKTV from 1 August 1996.
- See our dedicated Australia pages
UNITED STATES and CANADA
Doctor Who aired on at least two (known) major cable channels in the US in the 1980s and 1990s:
- See our dedicated US cable stations page for details
And of course most of the Canadian broadcasts of the series were on cable:
- See our dedicated Canada pages.
UK STATIONS
Doctor Who aired on two domestic UK satellite stations, both of which have their own dedicated page:
British Satellite Broadcasting (BSB)
BSB had a short-lived run from 1 April 1990 to 1 December 1990
- See our dedicated British Satellite Broadcasting page
UK Gold
UK Gold had a 15 year run of Doctor Who repeats, from 2 November 1992 to 14 April 2007.
- See our dedicated UK Gold page
UK / EUROPE
SUPER CHANNEL
Satellite television station Super Channel was launched on 30 January 1987, and broadcast across Europe.
- See our dedicated SUPER CHANNEL page
.
BBC PRIME
Launched in 1987, this station (previously called BBC TV Europe and then BBC World Service Television) was the BBC's first entertainment channel available via satellite and cable across Europe, Asia, the Middle East and Africa, broadcasting 24 hours a day.
BBC Prime aired a selection of BBC as well as ITV programming, including Doctor Who.
- See our dedicated BBC World Service Television Europe page
- See our dedicated BBC PRIME page
.
EUROPE
As noted above, several European countries were able to receive Super Channel and BBC Prime, but one digital satellite station was established solely for the Scandinavian market:
TV4 SCIENCE FICTION
TV4 Science Fiction is a satellite and cable television channel dedicated to the science fiction genre owned by TV4 AB. It was launched on 29 February 2008, and was broadcast to Denmark, Sweden, Finland, and Norway.
TRANSMISSION
TV4 SF screened all the available serials from the first seven Doctors. Episodes screened three times daily, usually early evening, just after midnight, then around 3.00am the following morning. It would appear that Doctor Who was part of the regular schedules since launch date in February 2008.
By May 2008, the Jon Pertwee stories were screening. By August, they had reached the Tom Baker stories, starting with Robot from the first Friday of that month.
By March 2009, the Sylvester McCoy stories were screening.
The series later moved to TV4 Guld (TV4 Gold):
Links
This category has the following 3 subcategories, out of 3 total.
