Rare Eighth Doctor Short Trips Re-released

As part of our celebrations of McGannuary – marking 25 years since Paul McGann first reprised the role of the Eighth Doctor on audio – today sees the release of a new collection of four short Doctor Who adventures featuring this popular incarnation. 

These stories were originally produced as bonus downloads for subscribers of the Doctor Who Monthly Range of audio dramas but have since become unavailable, until now. 

In the first two stories, the Doctor and Lucie visit a supermarket in which alien superweapons are disguised as tomatoes, before spending Christmas in a countryside B&B where the nearby caves hold a deadly secret. 

Then, the Doctor has a brief encounter with an old friend, Harry Sullivan, and finally lands the TARDIS in an unusual world where he finds a lonely boy sitting on his bed in the middle of an ocean. 

Doctor Who – Short Trips Rarities: An Eighth Doctor Collection is now available to purchase exclusively from the Big Finish website, as a digital download to own, for just £7.99. 

The four stories included in this collection are: 

Late Night Shopping by Matt Fitton, read by Hugh Ross 

The Doctor and Lucie Miller go on a Friday night shopping trip, where they encounter Miriam. Can a frying pan, olive oil, a side plate and an egg slice stop an alien attack? Or will supermarket manager Mr Smithson unintentionally aid the invasion by removing the long-haired stranger from his shop? 

This was originally released with subscriptions that included Masquerade (2014). 

The Caves of Erith by Alice Cavender, read by Stephen Critchlow 

The Doctor and Lucie decide to spend Christmas at a bed and breakfast in a quiet English village, and learn there has been a large decrease in childbirth there. They also discover there's an almost extinct variety of bats living nearby. What secret does the landlady's son Oscar hold? 

This was originally released with subscriptions that included You Are the Doctor and Other Stories (2015). 

Tuesday by Tony Jones, read by Stephen Critchlow 

The Eighth Doctor encounters his old friend Harry Sullivan outside a London cafe, but the naval surgeon has no recollection of the time traveller. Nor does he realise that it's Christmas Day – he's reading the paper on the 25th of December, 2001, as everyone goes about their daily business. What has happened to Christmas? 

This was originally released with subscriptions that included Muse of Fire (2018). 

An Ocean of Sawdust by Paul Starkey, read by Stephen Critchlow 

The Doctor meets Samuel, a little boy, pretending that his bed is a raft on the ocean, far away from land. But the bedroom floor shouldn't turn into a large wooden eel, should it? Why are paper birds flocking around? And why does Samuel have no memory of where he was before climbing onto his 'raft'? And what's the significance of the mobile hanging above the bed? 

This was originally released with subscriptions that included Harry Houdini's War and Tartarus (2019). 

Big Finish creative director Nicholas Briggs said: “As part of our McGannuary jollity, we’re re-releasing these four great Short Trips, previously only available to subscribers of our very first Doctor Who audio range which ran for 22 years and 275 stories. We wanted others to be able to luxuriate in the sheer McGann-ness of them! And with their single narrator style and modest duration, they’re ideal to listen to on the way to and from work, or short trips – see what I did there? – to relatives and friends.” 

Doctor Who – Short Trips Rarities: An Eighth Doctor Collection is now available to purchase exclusively here, as a digital download to own, for just £7.99. 

All the above prices (including pre-order and multibuy bundle discounts) are fixed for a limited time only and guaranteed no later than 28 February 2026.