Editing Shada (Doctor Who) (section)

===Big Finish audio play and web animation (2003)===
{{Anchor|Eighth Doctor}}
In 2003, the BBC commissioned [[Big Finish Productions]] to remake ''Shada'' as an audio play which was then webcast<ref name="Southall" /><ref name="bbcwebcasts" /> in six episodic segments, accompanied by limited [[Adobe Flash|Flash]] animation, on the [[bbc.co.uk|BBC website]] using illustrations provided by comic strip artist [[Lee Sullivan (comics)|Lee Sullivan]].<ref name="LeeSullivan" /> The play stars [[Paul McGann]] as the [[Eighth Doctor]] and [[Lalla Ward]] as Romana. The audio play was also broadcast on digital radio station [[BBC Radio 4 Extra|BBC7]], on 10 December 2005 (as a 2½-hour omnibus), and was repeated in six parts as the opening story to the Eighth Doctor's summer season, which began on 16 July 2006.

The webcast version (originally broadcast via BBCi's "Red Button") remains available from the BBC ''Doctor Who'' "classic series" website{{citation needed|date=November 2023}} and an expanded audio-only version is available for purchase on CD from Big Finish. This expanded version was the one broadcast on BBC7.

====Production====
Tom Baker was originally approached to reprise the role of the Doctor, but declined. The Eighth Doctor was then substituted and the story reworked accordingly.

Portions of the Big Finish version were reworked by [[Gary Russell]] to make the story fit into ''Doctor Who'' continuity. This included a new introduction, and a new explanation for the Fourth Doctor and Romana being "taken out of time" during the events of "The Five Doctors": the [[Eighth Doctor]] has come to collect Romana and K9 because he has begun to have a feeling that there was something they should have done at that time.{{citation needed|date=November 2012}}

When Skagra is investigating the Doctor, clips from three other Big Finish productions can be heard, exclusively on the CD version – ''[[The Fires of Vulcan]]'', ''[[The Marian Conspiracy]]'' and ''[[Phantasmagoria (audio drama)|Phantasmagoria]]''. The original serial was to have used clips from ''[[The Pirate Planet]]'' (1978), ''[[The Power of Kroll]]'' (1978–79), ''[[The Creature from the Pit]]'' (1979), ''[[The Androids of Tara]]'' (1978), ''[[Destiny of the Daleks]]'' (1979), and ''[[City of Death]]'' (1979).{{citation needed|date=November 2012}}

====Outside references====
In Episode 2 of the webcast version, when Chris is in his lab showing Clare the book, a vending machine-like object in the background is labelled "Nutrimat", a reference to a similar device in Adams' ''[[The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]]''. Two other references are a sequence where Skagra steals a [[Ford Prefect (car)|Ford Prefect]] and when images of ''Hitchhiker's Guide'' characters appear as inmates on Shada itself.