There’s a slightly celebratory atmosphere inside the Emporium this week. The glasses have been polished, the cork has been persuaded from the bottle, and somewhere between the shelves and the boxes comes the unmistakable sound of three men raising a toast to listeners scattered across the globe.
The shop, it seems, is busier than ever.
And with that, the boxes begin to stir once more…
The Post Box arrives laden with questions both deceptively simple and surprisingly dangerous. Is a love of Doctor Who something inherited… or something encountered at precisely the right moment in childhood? With both father and son seated behind the counter, the Emporium may be uniquely qualified to investigate. But matters grow rather more complicated when allegiances begin to shift. What, for example, is a parent supposed to do when a child wanders away from Gallifrey and pledges loyalty to Star Wars instead? Paul considers the possibility with all the concern of a man who knows only too well.
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The Props Box clangs ominously open to reveal the cold metallic history of the Cybermen. But behind the silver masks and electronic voices lies something rather more unsettling: genuine scientific and philosophical anxiety. The trio explore the reality of these marvellous monsters and the influence of Kit Pedler, whose fascination with cybernetics and the relationship between humanity and technology helped shape one of the programme’s most enduring creations. The result is a conversation that drifts from television monsters into the distinctly uncomfortable question of how much of ourselves we might willingly surrender in the name of progress.
The Travel Trunk transports the Emporium to Cardiff, where modern Doctor Who found a second home among the streets, bays, alleyways, and hidden corners of the city. There are memories of location hunting, unexpected discoveries, and standing in places suddenly made magical by television. But among the travellers sits one member of the trio who went a little further than the others, stepping aboard the TARDIS itself and emerging with whispers of closely guarded script secrets still rattling around in their head.
And as the evening draws on and the bottle grows lighter, conversation inevitably turns toward the future. What shape will Doctor Who take in the years ahead? Who might stand beside the BBC now the Disney arrangement has reached its conclusion? And perhaps most intriguingly of all… does the programme truly need a co-producer in the first place?
The Emporium offers no definitive answers, of course.
Only more doors to open.
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