Doctor Who Annual 1986

 was the twentieth and final Doctor Who annual published by World Distributors. It was released on September 1985.

Overview

 * Release Number 20
 * Publisher World Distributors
 * Released in September 1985
 * Priced £3.25
 * Format Hardback 64 pages
 * Featured Doctor: The Sixth Doctor
 * Featured Companions: Peri
 * Featured Enemies: The Master

Text stories

 * The Fellowship of Quan
 * Time Wake
 * Interface
 * Beauty and the Beast
 * Retribution
 * Davarrk's Experiment
 * The Radio Waves

Comic strip story

 * None

Features

 * `Behind the Scenes at Doctor Who: Make-Up` interview with Dorka Nieradzik by Brenda Aspley

Puzzles

 * None

Additional notes

 * Unusually, at the expense of new content, this annual featured three full-page colour publicity shots of the Sixth Doctor taken at his costume launch (showing him with the TARDIS, fishing and with a multicoloured umbrella).
 * The author of five of the prose stories (Interface, Davarrk's Experiment, The Fellowship of Quan, Time Wake and Retribution) was John D White, who loved the annuals as a kid and, when he was older, knew he wanted to write for them.
 * This was to be the last of the regular annuals published by World Distributors.
 * Both John Nathan-Turner and the publishers, World Distributors, had become increasingly frustrated with each other, along with the show's 18 month hiatus (resulting in no new Who on television) and a reported decline in sales the previous year. The decision was reached that the license to publish the Doctor Who Annual would not be renewed.
 * World Distributors did publish a further bumper sized volume (entitled Doctor Who Special: Journey Through Time), which featured reprinted pages from previous annuals and The Amazing World of Doctor Who book. This was similar to their earlier Adventures in Time and Space volume.
 * It was to be many years before there was another Doctor Who annual. It was not published by World Distributors.
 * For five of the in-between years (1991-1995) Marvel UK (publishers of Doctor Who Magazine) published a regular Doctor Who Yearbook which followed a format similar to the annuals, offering a mix of text stories, comic strip stories and features. These were significantly different from annuals in one respect. They did not review the year in question. Instead, they offered a mix of stories from every Doctor's era.