MOFFAT DESTROYED BY VASHTA NERADA
In devastating news for Doctor Who fans, the BBC today announced that newly appointed executive producer and head writer, Steven Moffat, was devoured overnight by a carnivorous swarm of vashta nerada. The multi-award winning screenwriter's propensity to generate plots and characters from personal experience is well documented, but even those closest to him hadn't realised the extent to which his "fiction" was grounded in reality.
Moffat's widow, Sue Vertue, was shocked by the sudden demise of her romantic and professional partner. "It's common knowledge that Steve based Press Gang and Chalk on his teaching experiences; Joking Apart was inspired by his first marriage, and Coupling drew on our own courtship," sobbed a tearful Ms Vertue, "but it never occurred to me that his Doctor Who monsters were real as well.
"In hindsight, I should have realised what was going on when I found a gas mask-clad orphan in the DVD cabinet who seemed confused about his parentage. And after those clockwork droids in baroque attire took over the local Laundromat, mysterious angel statues started turning up all over the house, always shifting around when our backs were turned. I can see now that Steven's scripts rather mirrored those events, but you don't tend to make such connections at the time. That would require some sort of lateral thinking."
A BBC spokesman expressed "deep regret" over what he termed "a terrible waste of a commission". "It's just incomprehensible," said the official, "I mean, everyone went on about his incredible imagination, but he hadn't imagined any of it. We might as well have been producing the Moffat autobiography."
"I hope what's happened to Steve serves as a warning to everybody to count the shadows," said Ms Vertue. "But obviously it can be confusing with certain lighting arrangements, so if you have two light sources of equal brightness forming an obtuse angle in front of you, dual penumbras behind you are nothing to worry about."
The tragedy has capped off a month of turmoil for the Doctor Who team, which has been subject to extensive media scrutiny over the last fortnight after star David Tennant alleged Russell T. Davies was "a Sontaran", whose only "weak spot" was a plug on the back of his "flabby, self-obsessed" neck. Tennant, switching randomly between his native Scottish inflection and a disturbingly convincing London accent, further jeopardised the future of the popular programme by claiming to have "screwed [co-star Catherine] Tate's armpit" after the comedienne overdosed on Lemsip and ecstasy.
Henry Henry, 2008.
