Celebrating Towel Day and Douglas Adams: Why We Love City of Death

It’s Towel Day, a time to celebrate the work of much-loved writer, Douglas Adams (The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy; Dirk Gently). And I’ve been working with Lovarzi to make this infographic.

Adams scripted the fan-favourite Doctor Who serial, City of Death, so we thought it would be the ideal time to look back on this four-parter from 1979. It meant I had to rewatch the story for research purposes. I worked with Maninder Singh Sahota, director of Lovarzi, and a great designer to fulfill this idea, but boy am I happy with how it’s turned out.

Plus Maninder’s running a competition until tomorrow night over at the Lovarzi site.

I obviously wrote all the copy, but I also worked with Maninder to whittle it down and then expand it further in several edits, and created a basic design. Oh, and then I helped distribute it. So all in all, I’m very proud of it. I’m proud of Maninder, the designer, and how well it’s done.

As a side-note, I met Julian Glover last year, and he’s a very nice guy – and of course, a great actor!

 

Doctor Who Scarf Press Release

ADVENT DAY SEVEN: Christmas. It’s not long away. And to celebrate advent, new content will be added to this blog every day in the countdown to the big day. You’ll see reviews, opinion pieces, links to some of my other work, videos – maybe even a short story! Remember to check back every day (in between the mad rush of packing presents, getting the freezer stocked up and watching Home Alone on repeat).

I’ve mentioned before my involvement with Lovarzi’s Doctor Who Fourth Doctor Scarf, whereby I wrote copy for their website, Amazon and a press release. You can read my initial article about this here.

The press release has been distributed to various physical publications and online too, and has got coverage in Doctor Who Magazine, SFX and Starburst, amongst many others.

So here I proudly present the official Fourth Doctor Scarf press release, written by me and approved by the people at Lovarzi and the BBC:

Doctor-Who-Scarf-Press-Release

I’ll be doing a round-up of coverage soon, so keep an eye out for that.

I loved doing it, and I love the actual scarf too. It’s been a pleasure working for Lovarzi, and I hope to do so again in the future.

 

Doctor Who Reviews: The Dalek Project; Fourth Doctor Scarf

Any followers of my blog will know that I’ve been a busy bee doing some PR for Lovarzi’s Doctor Who scarf. (And if you didn’t know that, you can do your research here.)

I happily received a scarf as part of my fee, and proudly displayed it where no one could see it, so it’ll avoid getting damaged. Naturally. Hey, I’m a fan, first and foremost – and a worrying, pernickety one at that.

But I still put it on, because I’m only human. Plus it gave me chance to do a review for the Doctor Who website I write for.

You can read the review here. And here’s a brief snippet. Ooh, I’m a tease.

“The colours are wonderfully bright, and as it’s 100% Acrylic, the scarf’s resistant to fading caused by sunlight (a massive relief for dedicated fans), as well as some oils, chemicals and, somehow, even moths!”

A big perk of working for Kasterborous is I get some special privileges that others might not. I’ll elucidate on this at another time, but I recently received a review copy of the new Doctor Who graphic novel, The Dalek Project.

You can read my review here, and, again, here’s a sneaky preview:

“There are quite a few new Dalek designs, all impressive, with very effective reveals. Two spoilerific models are particularly cool, channelling the ‘steampunk’ feel. There are some brilliant visuals, especially when a few Daleks emerge from the ground, and there’s a scene that’ll take readers back to that surreal cliffhanger in The Dalek Invasion of Earth.”

Finally, if you hover over my ‘portfolio’ tab, then click on ‘Introducing: Doctor Who,’ you’ll find a newly designed page, which I’ve been mulling over for a while now. Let me know what you think in the comments section of this post.

 

Web Copy for Lovarzi’s Doctor Who Scarf

My latest project is a really special one: PR for the Officially Licensed BBC Doctor Who scarf (like the one worn by Tom Baker) by Lovarzi.

The assignment involved two bits of web copy and a press release, advertising the scarf by specialists, Lovarzi, and I was immediately interested in not just the project, but also the product itself; after all, I’m a huge Doctor Who fan!

The scarf was worn by the fourth Doctor between his first adventure, 1974’s Robot, and his last in Logopolis (1981), and was known for its ridiculous length. Despite the huge popularity of the recent series, the Doctor will always be synonymous with that scarf, as will actor, Tom Baker. While at one stage, his scarf measured about three times the Doctor’s height, Lovarzi’s edition is a sensible 13ft – long enough to wrap around you, but short enough so you don’t trip up!

The two bits of web copy are now online: product descriptions for the Lovarzi site and Amazon UK. It was quite an enjoyable process; thinking about what people would be typing into Google to create SEO-friendly copy (hence Tom Baker, the TARDIS and the Daleks all getting a mention!). Lovarzi’s customer services had to be highlighted too, I felt, as many companies don’t look after buyers as well as they should – so I was keen to point out the free postage and packaging, and the 90 days money back guarantee.

A far more extensive press release has been approved by BBC Worldwide, and will be distributed by Lovarzi and me. However, it’s already got attention in Forbidden Planet and on websites like Kasterborous and The Doctor Who Site.

It’s got a couple of wonderful 5-star reviews on Amazon UK too. I’m really pleased with mine and definitely recommend it to any Whovians out there!

I’ve been working on it with Maninder Singh Sahota, Director of Lovarzi, who very kindly said:

“We were looking for a copywriter who is Doctor Who fan as well to write us copy for the press release and product descriptions. No one other than a real fan can understand the story behind extremely long Doctor Who scarf. And man, we found someone really good in Philip Bates! He knows the whole story behind the scarf. The way he has put it into words; it’s a no brainer that this copy will be loved by Doctor Who fans and will help us sell our product better. We are looking to hire his services again in the near future.”

Huge thanks to Maninder, who’s a pleasure to work for. You can find further testimonials here.

This definitely isn’t the last you’ll hear about this – I’ll also have some very exciting Doctor Who news coming up too – so stay tuned!