A quick glance at the various versions of The Reign of Terror which have been made available for home consumption reveal that all of the artists and designers are very much taken with the image of the First Doctor in his fancy Revolutionary Official of the Provinces uniform.
Every one of these covers uses it - often making use of one specific publicity photograph. This depicted Hartnell in the distinctive costume with its plumed hat, flanked by the Jailer and Lemaitre on the Conciergerie prison set.
We first see it on the cover of the Target novelisation, which was written by Ian Marter and published in 1987. The artist is Tony Masero.
Marter, who played Harry Sullivan in Seasons 12 and 13, novelised eight stories, beginning with a couple of adventures in which his character had featured -The Ark in Space and The Sontaran Experiment. His works were notable for some explicit gore and strong language. Towards the end he was helping range editor Nigel Robinson to finish off the outstanding Hartnell stories such as this one.
Something else which most of the various covers have in common is the image of the guillotine, despite this only appearing in one very brief (2 secs) scene at the opening of the second episode - appropriately titled Guests of Madame Guillotine.
If there's one objection I might have to Masero's cover, it's the fact that it looks like the Doctor is on his way to the guillotine, and the people are shaking their fists at him.
The UK VHS release bucks the trend by not featuring the guillotine and using a different image of the uniformed Doctor. Instead we get the tailor character rather prominently featured, who is hardly of any great importance or significance in the story. Lemaitre, Leon or even the Jailer would have been more apt.
There also appears to be a large army on the horizon, which has no relevance to the story whatsoever. The missing Parts 4 and 5 were covered by Carole Ann Ford describing events to camera, filmed at the Museum of the Moving Image on London's Southbank. It was hosting a large Doctor Who exhibition - "Behind the Sofa". I first saw this material when the story was shown at the NFT, where it raised a laugh as it was nigh impossible to follow.
The US VHS cover is different to the UK one. It features our Hartnell image again as well as the guillotine, but adds Barbara and Susan on the tumbril, which is far more appropriate than the UK version. Again it was coupled with the orphan Troughton material. It was released as part of the 11 story set "The End of the Universe Collection" which completed the VHS range in the USA.
I don't usually mention the Australian version of the covers as they are generally identical to the UK ones, other than some typographical differences. However, the Aussie cover for this story combines the UK release with images from the Troughton material. The Troughton image is the one from the box set cover (a photograph from The Ice Warriors) whilst the Yeti picture is taken from The Abominable Snowmen, but has had glowing eyes added to match their appearance in The Web of Fear.
Lee Binding opts for both our Hartnell image and the guillotine for the DVD cover, which is the same for both UK and US markets. He mirrors the shape of the guillotine with that of the TARDIS - surprising no-one else thought of this before - and an image of the tumbril with Susan and Barbara is used again.
The feathered plume on the Doctor's hat is too big to be contained on the UK cover and actually overlaps onto the TARDIS roundel banner. A large sticker promoted the fact that the story had animated episodes. The UK version of the DVD was released in January 2013.
The story's soundtrack was released in February 2006, with narration by Carole Ann Ford, who also supplied a bonus interview. This manages to feature our Hartnell image, the guillotine and the ladies in the tumbril, but adds that treacherous tailor, Barbara being chatted up by Leon Colbert, and the burning farmhouse from the first cliff-hanger.
Marter's novelisation was released on CD in 2021. As with The Keys of Marinus audiobook, the reader is Jamie Glover who played William Russell in An Adventure in Space and Time, and who has subsequently played Ian Chesterton on audio.
The Masero cover is expanded only very slightly on either side, with more of the background buildings showing. Very few of the audiobook covers will take advantage of the squarer shape to fully expand the images. Like the cover for Doctor Who - The Sensorites, the background colour has been toned down and is not so bright.
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