Australia was also a key market for the many products licensed by BBC Enterprises and the success of the series in Australia was an important factor in its worldwide penetration; English-speaking countries in the Asia-Pacific region generally bought whatever episodes the ABC had cleared for its own use, and BBC Enterprises' office for the entire region was in Sydney and dealt with the censors and marketing.
[1] The ABC had intended to begin broadcasting the series in April 1964, but had been forced to delay it because censors had classified the first three Doctor Who serials as suitable for adults only.
[3] In Sydney in 1975, the ABC screened just fourteen weekly instalments of Doctor Who – The Time Warrior, Death to the Daleks and The Monster of Peladon – between March and June.
Apparently, The Afternoon Show's host, James Valentine, was influential in getting this serial added to the ABC's broadcast run.
The ABC premiere of the movie was on Sunday 7 July at 8.30 pm, nearly two months after its Canadian and US debut and almost six weeks after its first airing in the UK.
The ABC had originally planned a 3 July airdate, but did not want to clash with The X-Files, which was already established in the 8:30 pm Wednesday timeslot and was achieving its peak success in Australia at the time.
A publicity screening of the cut version had been held on 5 June at Planet Hollywood in Sydney, with several fan-built Daleks operated by fan club members acting as ushers.
Following the UK broadcast by less than two months, Series 1 of the new Doctor Who premiered in Australia with the first episode, Rose, on 21 May 2005,[14][15] going on to win its timeslot in four out of five capital cities.
[22] There may have been some isolated Australian branches of Keith Miller's British Doctor Who club,[23] and there was at least one small suburban club-ette in Sydney around 1974 (recalled by Kerrie Dougherty),[citation needed] as well as occasional signs of fan activity here and there (e.g. a fan organised film screening in Sydney of Daleks - Invasion Earth 2150 AD in 1975,[citation needed] and an issue of a Tolkien fanzine devoted to Doctor Who, issued as "Macra" in late 1975).
The change at Sydney into a Doctor Who fanclub with fanzine (Zerinza) requires an outline of some of the broadcasting context as it related to fans (in more detail above).
Fed up with such sporadic sequencing during 1974–77, a Sydney fan, Antony Howe, began to agitate to have the series shown in full, and soon after the premieres in Britain rather than being screened years later.
Such criticisms were made public in the special "Dalek Soit" science fiction edition of the famous student newspaper Honi Soit which featured news and photographs of the club Dalek's conquest of the campus, and an appreciative quasi-academic article on the Doctor Who TV series, by local science fiction author Terry Dowling.
During the vacation Antony Howe learned the ABC had actually decided to cease purchasing any new episodes of the series, and the planned "Dalek Demo" now had a more urgent goal – to "Save Doctor Who".
Eventually the ABC did buy the new series (season 2 and 3 of Tom Baker), Howe believes this was probably due to the high ratings in Britain, rather than to his own efforts.